1981 January 20

On the day that Ronald Reagan was inaugurated, I was living in Vernon, Texas.  We had our TV upstairs in the art studio, so we were settled in for the day.  While we were watching all the subsequent events, the news came that the Iranian hostages had been released.  It was incredible!  We were glued to the TV.

Ronald Reagan taking the oath of office

Then we heard explosions...  Couldn't imagine what it was, no sirens, no smoke outside, nothing.  I went downstairs and I soon figured out what had happened.  I had put eggs on to boil to make egg salad for dinner, and they had all exploded!  

Oops

All the water had boiled away and the eggs just blew up, all over the kitchen and the ceiling.  I couldn't help but laugh.  It was a good day!

Hostages at Andrews AFB on 1/27/1981

On Jan. 20, 1981, Iran released 52 Americans who had been held hostage for 444 days, minutes after the presidency had passed from Jimmy Carter to Ronald Reagan. The hostages were placed on a plane in Tehran as Reagan delivered his inaugural address.

The New York Times said that Reagan’s address “made no reference at all to the long-awaited release of the hostages” as he was “apparently following a self-imposed restraint of not saying anything until the Americans had left Iranian air space.”

Reagan announced the release of the hostages later in the afternoon at a Congressional luncheon. “The news seemed to turn the inauguration celebration, normally a highly festive occasion, into an event of unbridled joy for Mr. Reagan and his supporters,” The Times wrote.

The Iran Hostage Crisis had begun on Nov. 4, 1979, when a group of several hundred militant Islamic students broke into the United States embassy in Tehran and took its occupants hostage. The students initially intended to hold the hostages for only a short time, but changed their plans when their act garnered widespread praise in Iran. Ayatollah Khomeini, leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution and the country’s supreme leader, was among the supporters.

In response, President Carter imposed economic sanctions on Iran. In April 1980, he authorized a rescue mission, Operation Eagle Claw, conducted by the U.S. military. The mission failed badly, as two U.S. aircraft collided, killing eight military personnel. The prolonged crisis came to reflect poorly on Mr. Carter, who was seen as weak for failing to secure the hostages’ release. Ronald Reagan’s defeat of President Carter in the 1980 presidential election happened to fall on the one-year anniversary of the hostage-taking.

Mr. Carter continued to negotiate for the hostages’ release until the end of his term of office. Finally, on Jan. 19, 1981, Algerian-mediated talks between the U.S. and Iran produced an agreement to end the crisis.