Year retrospective · 1990s

1997

1997 (MCMXCVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1997th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 997th year of the 2nd millennium, the 97th year of the 20th century, and the 8th year of the 1990s decade.

Recorded events

10

top entries

Notable births

30

Notable deaths

30

Decade

1990s

Timeline

Defining events of 1997

  1. 1997 Comet Hale–Bopp is seen passing at perihelion.

    Great Comet of 1997

    Comet Hale–Bopp is a long-period comet that was one of the most widely observed of the 20th century and one of the brightest seen for many decades.

  2. 1997 Tiger Woods becomes the youngest golfer to win the Masters Tournament.

    American professional golfer (born 1975)

    Eldrick Tont "Tiger" Woods is an American professional golfer. Woods is widely regarded as one of the greatest golfers of all time and as one of the most famous athletes in modern history. He is tied for first in PGA Tour wins, ranks second in men's major championships, holds numerous golf records, and is an inductee of the World Golf Hall of Fame.

  3. 1997 Pai Hsiao-yen, daughter of Taiwanese artiste Pai Bing-bing, is kidnapped on her way to school, preceding her murder.

    1997 murder in Taiwan

    Pai Hsiao-yen was the only daughter of popular Taiwanese television host and actress Pai Bing-bing and Japanese author Ikki Kajiwara. In April 1997, Pai was kidnapped, held for ransom, and murdered by a group of people led by Chen Chien-hsing, Lin Chun-sheng, and Kao Tien-meen, a trio of criminals previously known to the National Police Agency. Chen, Lin, and Kao evaded a police manhunt for up to eight months, during which they abducted two other people for ransom and killed four people, including a police officer.

  4. 1997 The Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993 enters into force, outlawing the production, stockpiling and use of chemical weapons by its signatories.

    Multilateral treaty prohibiting the production, stockpiling, and use of chemical weapons

    The Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), officially the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction, is an arms control treaty administered by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), an intergovernmental organization based in The Hague, Netherlands. The treaty entered into force on 29 April 1997. It prohibits the use of chemical weapons, and the large-scale development, production, stockpiling, or transfer of chemical weapons or their precursors, except for very limited purposes.

  5. 1997 The Thalit massacre begins in Algeria; all but one of the 53 inhabitants of Thalit are killed by guerrillas.

    Massacre of villagers by Islamists during the Algerian Civil War

    The Thalit massacre took place in Thalit village, some 70 km from Algiers, on April 3–4, 1997 during the Algerian Civil War. Fifty-two out of the 53 inhabitants were killed by having their throats cut during a 12-hour rampage. The homes of the villagers were burned down afterward.

  6. 1997 Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Columbia is launched on STS-83. However, the mission is later cut short due to a fuel cell problem.

    Space Shuttle orbiter (1981–2003)

    Space Shuttle Columbia (OV-102) was a Space Shuttle orbiter manufactured by Rockwell International and operated by NASA. Named after the first American ship to circumnavigate the globe, and the female personification of the United States, Columbia was the first of five Space Shuttle orbiters to fly in space, debuting the Space Shuttle launch vehicle on its maiden flight on April 12, 1981 and becoming the first spacecraft to be re-used after its first flight when it launched on STS-2 on November 12, 1981. As only the second full-scale orbiter to be manufactured after the Approach and Landing Test vehicle Enterprise, Columbia retained unique external and internal features compared with later orbiters, such as test instrumentation and distinctive black chines.

  7. 1997 In Greene County, Tennessee, the Lillelid murders occur.
  8. 1997 Sixteen people are killed when Formosa Airlines Flight 7601 crashes near Beigan Airport in the Matsu Islands of Taiwan.
  9. 1997 Souhane massacre in Algeria; over 60 people are killed and 15 kidnapped.
  10. 1997 Egon Krenz, the former East German leader, is convicted of a shoot-to-kill policy at the Berlin Wall.

Arrivals

Born in 1997

Asa Butterfield 1997– English actor (born 1997)
Álex Palou 1997– Spanish racing driver (born 1997)
Claire Wineland 1997– American activist and author (1997–2018)
Mateo Cassierra 1997– Colombian footballer (born 1997)
Kyle Walker-Peters 1997– English footballer (born 1997)
D. J. Moore 1997– American football player (born 1997)
Ashleigh Gardner 1997– Australian cricketer Maisie Williams 1997– British actress (born 1997)
Dillon Bassett 1997– American racing driver
Abdelhak Nouri 1997– Dutch footballer (born 1997)
Austin Riley 1997– American baseball player (born 1997)
Alexander Zverev 1997– German tennis player (born 1997)

Farewells

Died in 1997

Makar Honcharenko Ukrainian footballer (1912–1997)
Michael Dorris American writer (1945–1997)
George Wald Nobel Prize-winning American Scientist and Activist
Bryant Bowles American white supremacist
Alan Cooley Australian public servant (born 1920)
Dorothy Frooks American journalist
Voldemar Väli Estonian wrestler (1903–1997)
Chaim Herzog President of Israel from 1983 to 1993
Tomoyuki Tanaka Japanese film producer (1910–1997)
Diosdado Macapagal President of the Philippines from 1961 to 1965
Allan Francovich American film producer
Pat Paulsen American comedian and satirist (1927–1997)

On the charts

Culture of 1997

By month

Across the calendar of 1997

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