William F Stroop (1960 - 2010)

Refresh this page to see various historical events that occurred during William's lifetime.

In 1960, in the year that William F Stroop was born, on May 1st, an American CIA U-2 spy plane, piloted by Francis Gary Powers, was shot down by a surface-to-air missile over the Soviet Union. Powers ejected and survived but was captured. The U.S. claimed that the U-2 was a "weather plane" but Powers was convicted in the Soviet Union of espionage. He was released in 1962 after 1 year, 9 months and 10 days in prison.

In 1971, William was only 11 years old when in March, Intel shipped the first microprocessor to Busicom, a Japanese manufacturer of calculators. The microprocessor has since allowed computers to become smaller and faster, leading to smaller and more versatile handheld devices, home computers, and supercomputers.

In 1981, he was 21 years old when on January 20th, Ronald Reagan became the 40th President of the United States. He ran against the incumbent, Jimmy Carter, and won 50.7% of the popular vote to Carter's 41.0%.

In 1990, he was 30 years old when after 27 years in prison, Nelson Mandela, the leader of the movement to end South African apartheid was released on February 11th 1990.

In 1992, by the time he was 32 years old, on April 29th, riots began in Los Angeles after the "Rodney King" verdict was issued. Four LAPD officers had been accused of using excessive force (assault) on African-American Rodney King, who had been stopped for drunk driving. The beating had been videotaped. Their acquittal sparked a 6 day riot in Los Angeles.