May 24, 1992

Gas cost $1.13 a gallon in the spring of 1992, and the Dow Jones stood at 3,301 — a country otherwise focused on a presidential election year, with incumbent George H.W. Bush facing a primary challenge and Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton emerging as the leading Democratic contender. On the cultural front, Vanessa Williams held the number one spot on the charts with "Save The Best For Last," while "The Silence of the Lambs" had just taken home the Academy Award for Best Picture. In sports, Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls defeated the Portland Trail Blazers to claim their second consecutive NBA championship, the same spring that white South Africans voted in a referendum to end apartheid and begin the transition to a multi-racial government — a landmark moment that set the stage for the formal dismantling of a system that had defined South Africa for more than four decades.