Year of Change

20 years ago today, Newspaper headlines throughout the world rang out to the fall of the Berlin Wall. In fact, 1989 was a year that reshaped our world. Arguably, there’ve been other momentous years even in recent times—the Suez crisis, Cuban missile crisis, our entry into what was then called the common market, decimalisation, for example—but 1989 saw freedom in Europe on an unprecedented scale. 1989—year of considerable change...

Sunday Times magazine front cover, May 2009

Kegworth air disaster; Solidarity union legalised in Poland; Soviets leave Afghanistan after nine bloody years; Sky TV finally launches; first GPS satellite enters orbit; death threats made against author of the Satanic Verses; agreement eventually reached on the banning of CFCs; the Purley rail crash; the Exxon Valdez spills its 9mil gallons of oil off Alaska; Soviet troops kill civilians during peaceful Georgian rally in capital Tbilsi; Hillsborough disaster kills 96 Liverpool football fans; Hungary dismantles 150 miles of barbed wire along Austria border soon followed by historic reburial of 1958 executed leader Imre Nagy; Tiananmen Square massacre in Peking; Solidarity wins in free elections in Poland; space shuttle Columbia takes off for the first time; Dow Jones Industrial Average crashes; Guildford Four freed after 14 years; free movement allowed between east and west Berlin as Wall is torn down; Velvet Revolution begins in Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia; Romanian revolution sees historic Christmas changes in Bucharest.		Grampian Regional Transport sold to management under Moir Lockhead; Trinity buys Hestair Group vehicle division; Southern National buys Brutonian; Drawlane buys Crosville; National Welsh buys Inter Valley Link; Lincoln closes both Lincoln taxi & Scunthorpe minibus operations; South Yorkshire Transport launches Eager Beavers; Docklands Transit commences; London Buses fragments; Stagecoach buys East Midlands; Stagecoach buys Ribble; London Country South West renamed London & Country and passes to Drawlane; Shamrock & Rambler & Charlie's Cars close; Stagecoach takes over operations in Barrow; Busways privatised; Traction buys Gash; Plaxton buys Henlys; Trent buys Barton; Plaxton buys Duple; Stagecoach buys Southdown; Merthyr Tydfil Transport goes bankrupt; National Express buys Stagecoach Scottish expresses; Derby City Transport sold to consortium; Drawlane buys Midland Fox; Stagecoach buys Portsmouth; Metrobus design passes to Optare; Alexander North East split between Stagecoach Magic Bus and Grampian; United Bus formed upon DAF & Bova merger; Stagecoach buys Hastings & District.