On this day
Revisit the music, news, notable people, and historical moments connected to this date.
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LEAD: Democrats tried to put as good a face as possible today on the second Presidential debate. But they didn't seem happy in their work.
LEAD: A senior C.I.A. official said today that Mikhail S. Gorbachev's efforts to transform the Soviet economy did not have a good chance of succeeding.
LEAD: Government officials overseeing a nuclear weapon plant in Ohio knew for decades that they were releasing thousands of tons of radioactive uranium waste into the environment, exposing thousands of workers and residents in the region, a Congressional panel said today.
LEAD: The Reagan Administration has told Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar that it plans to keep withholding part of its United Nations dues this year until the organizationapproves a new austerity budget and other administrative changes, American and United Nations officials said today.
LEAD: President Roh Tae Woo of South Korea said today that he would ask the United Nations and its member countries to help bring about a reconciliation with North Korea that would ease tensions between the neighbors.
Music on My Birthday
The Top 50 albums for the chart week of October 12, 1988, covering October 15, 1988.
Bon Jovi
Guns N' Roses
Def Leppard
Soundtrack
Tracy Chapman
1988Dominique Jones, American basketball player[†]
Dominique O'Neal Jones is an American professional basketball player for the Changsha Wantian Yongsheng of the National Basketball League. A noted scorer in college at the University of South Florida, Jones had the second-highest scoring average in the Big East Conference during the 2009–10 season. Jones has had a long career in the CBA and was named the league's MVP in 2023.
1988Mesut Özil, German footballer[†]
Mesut Özil is a German former professional footballer who played as an attacking midfielder. Known for his ball control, technical skills, creativity, passing skills, and vision, he is widely regarded as one of the greatest midfielders and playmakers of his generation. He could also play as a wide midfielder.
1988Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, English composer, music critic, pianist and writer (born 1892)[†]
Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji was an English composer, music critic, pianist and writer whose music, written over a period of seventy years, ranges from sets of miniatures to works lasting several hours. One of the most prolific 20th-century composers, he is best known for his piano pieces, notably nocturnes such as Gulistān and Villa Tasca, and large-scale, technically intricate compositions, which include seven symphonies for piano solo, four toccatas, Sequentia cyclica and 100 Transcendental Studies. He felt alienated from English society by reason of his homosexuality and mixed ancestry, and had a lifelong tendency to seclusion.
In 1988, the world population was approximately 5,141,992,542 people[†]