Millennials, here’s the biggest North Carolina news story from the year you were born
Check out each year’s biggest North Carolina news story from 1981 to 1996.
Every generation has its challenges, such as Gen Z’s struggle with entering the workforce at present, while some sentiments are tied closer to age than the year in which you were born. Take the so-called “sandwich generation,” which has to balance saving for retirement with caring for kids and aging parents; this isn’t unique to a specific generation but is felt by many folks as they enter their mid-life years.
Many folks currently facing this are millennials. Exact definitions for generation ranges can vary slightly, but for simplicity’s sake, we’re going with the common range of those born between 1981 and 1996 when referring to millennials. Now, this generation has seen it all, including the transition from life before smartphones to a tech-filled world, but millennials might not remember what happened close to home when they were young. After all, they were babies!
That’s why we’re here with a roundup of the biggest news story in North Carolina for each birth year of the millennial generation. You might just feel closer to your home state after learning more about it.
1981: North Carolina’s Tar Heels team makes it to the NCAA finals but narrowly misses the win
The Tar Heels from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill had an impressive men’s basketball run leading up to the NCAA tournament in 1981. However, in a big upset, the Indiana Hoosiers sadly defeated the team in the finals on Mar. 30. The score came down to 63-50, and it was a big blow to the Tar Heels, who had been making their state proud all academic year long.
Still, the athletes had no choice but to be proud of themselves for making it all the way to the finals in Philadelphia—a feat to which only they and the Hoosiers could relate.
To learn more, read here.
1982: The Tar Heels return to the NCAA finals and clench the win for North Carolina
The last-second loss in 1981 left the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s athletes ready to prove themselves once more, so they set out on a mission to make the Tar Heels a team whose prowess no one could deny. And the next year, in 1982, they did just that.
The Tar Heels took on the Georgetown Hoyas in the finals in New Orleans on Mar. 29 and won the tournament with a single point, landing at a final score of 63-62. Naturally, this electrified all of North Carolina; folks statewide had just witnessed their local team make it big time on the national stage. But it was more than that—it was a huge moment for sports in general, with people still discussing that fateful day decades later.
To learn more, read here.
1983: The NCAA championship win stays in North Carolina—but not because of the Tar Heels
Ending North Carolina’s three-year record-breaking sports run is the 1983 NCAA championship in Albuquerque. The final battle was held on Apr. 4 that year and saw the North Carolina State University Wolfpack go head-to-head with the University of Houston Cougars. No amount of courage conjured by the Cougars could push the team over the finish line, and the Wolfpack claimed the victory with a final score of 54-52. What made this so satisfying was the Wolfpack being the underdog team in the final tournament.
Still, yet another North Carolina team proved that we have serious oomph to us—and we’re always going to do what we set our minds to.
To learn more, read here.
1984: Tornadoes ravage North Carolina, leaving many lost lives and injuries in their paths
Mar. 28 was a sobering day for North Carolina and its sister state, South Carolina. Together, the two experienced 22 tornadoes that tore through the states with unparalleled force. These twisters left over 1,000 people injured and 57 dead.
With them came countless instances of property damage, and communities were left with wounds that would last for a long time, from the people they lost to the homes they were left to rebuild.
To learn more, read here.
1985: A hurricane hits North Carolina and causes serious growing pains
The year 1985 was a significant one in North Carolina, with the state’s numbers showing that significantly more people were moving to the Tar Heel State than leaving it (via The New York Times). The state was growing in unprecedented ways, which is why a hurricane hitting it was especially devastating.
On Sep. 27, Hurricane Gloria entered the scene by tearing through the Outer Banks before heading further north. It would eventually reach New York and even Canadian waters before fizzling out, but the damage was done—over $900 million, to be precise.
To learn more, read here.
1986: A wildfire spreads to over 73,000 acres, displacing North Carolina residents
As if tornadoes and a hurricane weren’t enough natural disasters for a while, the 1986 Hampstead wildfire raged for 11 days before eventually being snuffed out. Firefighters and the U.S. Marine Corps worked together to combat the inferno, totaling more than 800 service workers. With about 73,000 acres ablaze, every single one of them was needed to contain the fire. Despite the fire’s massive scale, only one person died during the ordeal, but about 50 were left injured.
To learn more, read here.
1987: A snowstorm serenades North Carolina after winter’s already passed
It’s normal for wildfires and twisters to be long-lasting news stories, but you might think that a snowstorm is small potatoes compared to them. Well, snow typically would be, but when it comes in April, when the sun is usually out and reviving the slumbering trees and flowers, and comes in spades, it creates a story that never dies. This is especially true for North Carolina, which doesn’t receive nearly as much snow as, say, New Hampshire.
Enter the early Apr. Snowstorm of 1987 that no one was expecting, which delivered more than a foot of snow in some areas of the state. It was a winter wonderland for a few days, but ultimately ended thanks to spring’s ever-shifting temperatures.
To learn more, read here.
1988: Another tornado creates havoc in North Carolina, this time in Raleigh
Just a few years after North Carolina was hit with tornadoes and a hurricane, an F4 twister struck Raleigh in Nov., leading to unequivocal damage. Several people were killed during the disaster, including a couple of children, and entire homes and businesses were leveled, including a church and a Kmart. The number of injured residents surpassed 150, and morale in the city tanked. The twister stayed its course for a whopping 84 miles before dissipating.
To learn more, read here.
1989: A Charlotte woman dies in a hit-and-run, but the culprit wouldn’t be found for decades
At a cursory glance, many of 1989’s biggest news stories were also weather-related—for instance, North Carolina’s coastal cities had a beautiful white Christmas (via the National Weather Service)—but when you dig a bit deeper, you find a fascinating story.
On Dec. 29 that year, a Charlotte woman was heartbreakingly killed in a hit-and-run accident, but the culprit, who immediately fled the scene, likely not knowing if the woman was alive or dead, was never identified. Cut to 2022, and the local police were tipped off, leading to new-age DNA testing that led them to an actual suspect. What did the police find? Reportedly, the man, who was in prison when questioned about the hit-and-run crime in 2024, confessed.
To learn more, click here.
1990: Jesse Helms wins controversial Senate reelection in North Carolina
Republican politician Jesse Helms served several terms in the U.S. Senate on behalf of North Carolina before his 1990 victory, and he’d go on to serve several more afterward. But that didn’t make him immune to controversy, and it didn’t mean he won by landslides, either.
In 1990, he ran against Democratic politician Harvey Gantt and narrowly won, garnering 53% of the total vote. Helms, who died in 2008, ran on strict conservative ideals, including not supporting LGBTQ+ teachers working in schools, making him not too dissimilar from present-day Republicans. A large portion of the population disagreed with Helms’ views, and analysts of the time recognized that his tactics would influence how other candidates campaigned in the future. “The national implication of this race is that the cultural and racial issues Helms raised … are powerful weapons for the Republican Party,” Gantt’s poll taker, Mike Donilon, said at the time.
To learn more, read here.
1991: A fire in a Hamlet factory claims 25 lives—and sparks outrage
In Hamlet, a small city in Richmond County, Sep. 3, 1991, will always be remembered as the day that 25 people lost their lives in a factory fire. Many others were left injured, and it’s no wonder why: According to witnesses who were in the Imperial Foods factory the day of the tragic event, emergency exits were, for some reason, locked, which trapped the workers in the factory while it went up in flames. The New York Times would later report that the factory was hit with a fine of $808,150 because of the deaths and injuries, but many felt this wasn’t enough. To learn more, read here.
1992: Five years after the April snowstorm, a harsher May cell hits North Carolina
If you thought that over a foot of snow in April was extreme, then May 1992’s snowstorm might be quite the shocker. By May, North Carolina is typically fully in spring mode, with temperatures getting quite warm. But that didn’t stop a cold front from hitting the state and sprinkling 30 inches—yes, two and a half feet of snow!—on top of Mount Mitchell, with other areas getting about a foot.
This snowstorm was largely reserved for areas with high elevation, but it was still a surprising event to unfold—and something that hasn’t been seen a ton since.
To learn more, read here.
1993: The “storm of the century” immediately put Mount Mitchell’s 30 inches of snow from 1992 to shame
In Mar. 1993, a powerful storm hit the entire East Coast, with North Carolina feeling its effects very strongly in the form of snow, sleet, powerful winds, and more. Thankfully for the Tar Heel State, Florida dealt with the storm’s tornadoes, but North Carolina was slammed with its winter weather. Mount Mitchell, which was graced with 30 inches of snow just 10 months prior, now had 50 inches—over four feet of snow—piled high on its surface.
The storm sadly didn’t stop there, either. Thousands of car accidents, hundreds of deaths, numerous power outages, and many closed airports in the affected states resulted from the storm.
To learn more, read here.
1994: The women’s Tar Heels team wins the NCAA tournament for the first time
Some 11 years after the men’s basketball team from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill was victorious at the NCAA tournament in New Orleans, the women’s Tar Heels team descended on Richmond, Va., to battle the Louisiana Tech Lady Techsters.
The team had had a successful season so far, and now at the final round, the athletes knew they had to secure the victory for their home state. And so they did. With a final score of 60-59, the Tar Heels emerged from the stadium triumphant.
To learn more, read here.
1995: Hog waste creates an ecological disaster in the New River
Sometimes, ecological disasters come from human pollution, and other times, they come from 25 million gallons of hog waste accidentally being dumped into a river.
Yes, this unfortunately happened in June 1995, after a dike broke, allowing the waste to flow freely into the river. The dike maintained an eight-acre plot of land used for hog waste, but once it entered the river, it immediately began poisoning the water and killing the local fish. It created controversy for more than one reason in the area, prompting larger questions about the hog industry as a whole.
To learn more, read here.
1996: Hurricane Fran leads to over 20 North Carolina resident deaths
Unfortunately, our fair North Carolina sits in prime hurricane territory, and in 1996, Hurricane Fran swept through the state, claiming 24 lives and amassing $5.2 billion in damage. If that weren’t enough, over 8 million acres of forest were destroyed in the hurricane, and over 4 million North Carolinians were left without power. Perhaps needless to say, all of North Carolina was left in a state of emergency on that sad Sep. day.
To learn more, read here.
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