What happened the year you were born?

The only important thing that happened the year I was born was the release of "Dirty Dancing."

1986

Off the top of my head: the Challenger blew up.

ACCORDING TO GOOGLE:

POLITICS and HISTORY

The world's worst nuclear accident takes place when a reactor blows up at Chernobyl Power Station
US warplanes bomb Libya
New Zealand refuses to admit nuclear warships into port- the US and Australia suspend the ANZUS alliance
Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson are married and become the Duke and Duchess of York
Space Shuttle Challenger explodes after take-off

TV and at the MOVIES
Sledge Hammer hammed up the LAPD
Paul Hogan was the Crocodile Dundee
Howard the Duck just plain old sucked
Meryl Streep was Out of Africa with Robert Redford
Bette Midler and Danny DeVito were Ruthless People
A kooky cat eating critter from outer space, Alf, became an instant craze
Valerie briefly streaked across our screens

People who died in 1986
The Challenger Crew
Cary Grant (b.1925) American actor
James Cagney (b.1940) American actor
Desi Arnez (b.1915) American actor
L. Ron Hubbard (b.1911) Science Fiction writer
Benny Goodman (b.1909) American bandleader
Ted Knight (b. ) American actor
Donna Reed (b.1921) American actress
Wallis Simpson (b.1896) Duchess of Windsor

[Edited on Dec 03, 2005 by Avivah]

Gainsbourg wrote a song about it: 69 L'annee erotique

Also:






...

1979

January

* January 1 - United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the "International Year of the Child." Many musicians donate to the "Music for UNICEF" fund.
* January 1 - Sino-American relations: United States and the People's Republic of China establish diplomatic relations
* January 4 - State of Ohio agrees to pay $675,000 to families of dead and injured in Kent State University shootings.
* January 7 - Vietnam and Vietnam-backed Cambodian insurgents announce the fall of Phnom Penh, Cambodian capital, and the collapse of the Pol Pot regime. Pol Pot and Khmer Rouge retreat to Thailand
* January 8 - The French tanker Betelgeuse explodes at the Gulf Oil terminal at Bantry in Ireland - 50 dead

* January 13 - YMCA sues the Village People for libel because of their song of the same name
* January 16 - The Shah of Iran flees Iran with his family and relocate to Egypt after a year of turmoil.
* January 19 - Former US Attorney General John N. Mitchell released on parole after 19 months at a federal prison in Alabama
* January 29 - Brenda Ann Spencer opens fire at random in San Diego, California, killing two teachers and wounding 8 students


February

* February 1 - Convicted bank robber Patty Hearst is released from prison after her sentence was commuted by President Jimmy Carter
* February 1 - Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Tehran, Iran after nearly 15 years of exile.
* February 2 - Sid Vicious dies of heroin overdose
* February 3 - Khomeini creates the Council of the Islamic Revolution
* February 7 - Supporters of Khomeini take over the Iranian law enforcement, courts and government administration
* February 7 - Pluto moves inside Neptune's orbit for the first time since either planet was known to science.
* February 10-February 11 - Iranian army mutinies and joins the Islamic Revolution
* February 11 - Khomeini seizes power in Iran.
* February 14 - In Kabul, Muslim extremists kidnap the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs, who is later killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police
* February 14 - Musician Walter Carlos reveals that he has undergone a sex change operation and become Wendy
* February 17 - The People's Republic of China invades northern Vietnam, launching the Sino-Vietnamese War.
* February 22 - Independence of Saint Lucia from the United Kingdom.


March
Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel sign the Camp David Accords.
Enlarge
Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel sign the Camp David Accords.

* March 1 - Scotland voted narrowly for home rule, which was not implemented, and Wales voted against
* March 5 - Voyager I passes Jupiter
* March 13 - In Grenada, Maurice Bishop leads a successful coup
* March 14 - In China, a Hawker-Siddeley Trident crashes into a factory near Beijing killing at least 200
* March 25 - The first fully functional space shuttle orbiter, Columbia, was delivered to the John F. Kennedy Space Center to be prepared for its first launch
* March 26 - In a ceremony at the White House, President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel sign a peace treaty
* March 28 - Nuclear power plant accident at Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania, releases radiation
* March 28 - In Britain, Jim Callaghan's government loses a motion of confidence by one vote, forcing a general election
* March 29 - Sultan Yahya Petra ibni Almarhum Sultan Ibrahim Petra, 6th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia dies in office. He is replaced by Sultan Haji Ahmad Shah Al-Mustain Billah ibni Almarhum Sultan Sir Abu Bakar Riayatuddin Al-Muadzam Shah, Sultan of Pahang.
* March 30 - Airey Neave, World War Two veteran and Conservative Northern Ireland spokesman, is killed by INLA bomb in British House of Commons car park
* March 31 - The Royal Navy withdraws from Malta


April-May
Margaret Thatcher, the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
Enlarge
Margaret Thatcher, the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

* April 1 - Iran's government becomes Islamic Republic by a 98% vote, overthrowing the Shah officially
* April 1-April 18 - Police lock Andreas Mihavecz in a holding cell in Bregenz, Austria and forget him there for the next 18 days without food or drink
* April 2 - Soviet biowarfare laboratory at Sverdlovsk accidentally releases airborne anthrax spores. 66 dead plus unknown amount of livestock
* April 4 - President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of Pakistan is executed
* April 10 - A tornado hits in Wichita Falls, Texas killing 42 people. It was the most notable tornado of twenty-six that hit that day.
* April 11 - Tanzanian troops take Kampala, the capital of Uganda. Idi Amin flees
* April 17 - Schoolchildren in the Central African Republic arrested for protesting against wearing the expensive, school uniforms. Around 100 killed.
* April 23 - Fighting in London between the Anti-Nazi League and the Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group results in the death of protestor Blair Peach
* May 1 - Greenland gets home rule
* May 4 - Conservatives win the British general election; Margaret Thatcher becomes the new prime minister.
* May 9 - Unabomber bomb injures Northwestern University graduate student John Harris
* May 10 - The Federated States of Micronesia becomes self-governing.
* May 25 - American Airlines Flight 191: In Chicago, Illinois, a DC-10 crashes during takeoff at O'Hare International Airport killing 271 on board and two people on the ground.


June

* June 1 - The first black-led government of Rhodesia in 90 years takes power, in succession to Ian Smith and under his power-sharing deal.
* June 2 - Pope John Paul II visits his native Poland, becoming the first Pope to visit a Communist country
* June 3 - A blowout at the Ixtoc I oil well in the southern Gulf of Mexico causes at least 600,000 tons (176,400,000 gallons) of oil to be spilled into the waters, the worst oil spill to date. Some estimate the spill to be 428 million gallons, making it the largest unintentional oil spill ever.
* June 4 - Joe Clark becomes Canada's sixteenth, and youngest, prime minister.
* June 12 - Bryan Allen flies the Gossamer Albatross, man powered, across the English Channel.
* June 18 - Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev sign the SALT II agreement in Vienna.
* June 20 - a national guard soldier in Nicaragua kills ABC TV news correspondent Bill Stewart and his interpreter Juan Espinosa. Other members of the news crew capture the killing on tape
* June 23 - Sydney: New South Wales Premier Neville Wran officially opens the Eastern Suburbs Railway. It operates as a shuttle between Central & Bondi Junction until full integration with the Illawarra Line during 1980.


July-August

* July 2 - The Susan B. Anthony one-dollar coin is introduced in the US.
* July 3 - President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul.
* July 9 - A car bomb destroys a Renault owned by "Nazi hunters" Serge and Beate Klarsfeld at their home in France. A note purportedly from ODESSA claims responsibility.
* July 11 - The space station Skylab returns to Earth.
* July 12 - A "Disco Demolition Night" publicity stunt goes awry at Comiskey Park forcing the Chicago White Sox to forfeit their game against the Detroit Tigers.
* July 12 - Assassination of Carmine Galante, boss of Bonanno mafia family
* July 13 - Skylab re-enters the Earth atmosphere; the wreckage lands in Australia
* July 16 - Iraqi President Hasan al-Bakr resigns and Vice President Saddam Hussein replaces him
* July 17 - Nicaraguan president General Anastasio Somoza Debayle resigns and flees to Miami; Sandinistas form a new government on July 19.
* July 19 - The Marxist Sandinistas take control of Nicaragua
* July 19 - Maria de Lurdes Pintasilgo becomes prime minister of Portugal
* July 24 - Soviet Union exchanges Gerald Brook for spies Peter and Helen Kroger with United Kingdom
* July 31 - 400 Iranian pilgrims are killed after clashes with Saudi security forces in Mecca
* August 5 - Polisario signs a peace treaty with Mauritania
* August 5 - Government of Mauritania signs a peace treaty with Polisario
* August 9 - The first British nudist beach is established in Brighton
* August 27 - Lord Mountbatten and three others assassinated by the I.R.A..

September-October

* September 1 - The American Pioneer 11 becomes the first spacecraft to visit Saturn when it passes the planet at a distance of 21,000 km
* September 7 - The Chrysler Corporation asks the United States government for $1 billion to avoid bankruptcy.
* September 7 - ESPN starts broadcasting.
* September 16 - Three families flee from East Germany by balloon
* September 20 - French paratroopers help David Dacko to overthrow Bokassa
* September 22 - The South Atlantic Flash is observed near Bouvet Island, thought to be a nuclear weapons test.
* October 14 - A major gay rights march in the United States takes place in Washington, DC, involving many tens of thousands of people.
* October 16 - 23 people die in Nice, France, when the coastal town is hit by a tsunami
* October 21 - 259 Muslim radicals occupy Kaaba and the Grand Mosque in Mecca. Saudi Arabian army goes in to expel them
* October 26 - South Korean president Park Chunghee killed by KCIA head Kim Jaekyu.
* October 27 - Saint Vincent and the Grenadines gains independence.


November
Iranian students burn the American flag on the wall of the American Embassy in Tehran, shortly after siezing the compound.
Enlarge
Iranian students burn the American flag on the wall of the American Embassy in Tehran, shortly after siezing the compound.

* November 1 - Iran hostage crisis: Iranian Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini urged his people to demonstrate on November 4 and to expand attacks on United States and Israeli interests
* November 2 - French police shoots gangster Jacques Mesrine in Paris
* November 3 - In Greensboro, North Carolina, five members of the Communist Workers Party are shot to death and seven are wounded by a group of Klansmen and neo-Nazis during a "Death to the Klan" rally
* November 4 - Iran hostage crisis begins: 3000 Iranian radicals, mostly students, invade the United States embassy in Tehran and take 90 hostages (63 of whom are American). They demand that the United States send the former shah back to Iran to stand trial.
* November 5 - The radio news program Morning Edition premieres on National Public Radio.
* November 6 - At Montevideo , Uruguay the International Olympic Committee adopts a resolution where Taiwan Olympic and sports team participate with the name Chinese Taipei in future Olympics Games and international sports tournaments and championships .
* November 12 - Iran hostage crisis: In response to the hostage situation in Tehran, US President Jimmy Carter orders a halt to all oil imports into the United States from Iran
* November 14 - Iran hostage crisis: US President Jimmy Carter issues Executive Order 12170, freezing all Iranian assets in the United States and US banks in response to the hostage crisis
* November 16 - Bucharest Metro Line 1 is opened, in Bucharest, Romania (from Timpuri Noi to Semanatoarea stations, 8.63 km)
* November 17 - Iran hostage crisis: Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini orders the release of 13 female and black American hostages being held at the US Embassy in Tehran.
* November 20 - A group of around 200 militant Muslims occupied Mecca's Grand Mosque. They were driven out by French commandos (allowed into the city under these special circumstances despite their being non-Muslims) after bloody fighting that left 250 people were killed and 600 wounded.
* November 20 - Group of Sunni muslims barricade themselves into the Holy Mosque of Mecca. They hold out until December 4
* November 21 - After false radio reports from the Ayatollah Khomeini that the Americans had occupied the Great Mosque in Mecca, the United States Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan is attacked by a mob, practitioners of that "religion of peace", and set afire, killing four. (see: Foreign relations of Pakistan)
* November 23 - In Dublin, Ireland, Irish Republican Army member Thomas McMahon is sentenced to life in prison for the assassination of Lord Mountbatten
* November 28 - The Mount Erebus disaster: an Air New Zealand DC-10 crashes into Mount Erebus on a sightseeing trip, killing all 257 people on board.

December

* December 5 - Jack Lynch resigns as Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland. Successor Charles Haughey.
* December 21 - Ceasefire for Rhodesia signed at London
* December 24 - Soviet Union invades Afghanistan
* December 24 - The launch of the first European Ariane rocket.
* December 26 - In Rhodesia, 96 Patriotic Front guerillas enter the capital Salisbury to monitor a ceasefire that begins in December 28
* December 27 - The Soviet Union seizes control of Afghanistan and Babrak Karmal replaces overthrown and executed President Hafizullah Amin.

Unknown dates

* The World Health Organization declares the world free of naturally occurring smallpox.
* UNICEF declares 1979 the "International Year of the Child."
* VisiCalc becomes the first spreadsheet program.
* Guardian Angels civilian patrol group forms in New York City.
* Sprengel Museum opens in Hanover, Germany.
* Windsor Tower was built in Madrid, Spain.
* The first usenet experiments were conducted by Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis of Duke University.


Births

* January 15 - Mary Pierce, American tennis player
* January 16 - Aaliyah, American singer (d. 2001)
* January 20 - Rob Bourdon, American drummer (Linkin Park)
* January 21 - Brian O'Driscoll, Irish rugby player
* January 24 - Tatyana Ali, American actress
* January 29 - Sui Feifei, Chinese basketball player
* February 9 - Mena Suvari, American actress
* February 9 - Zhang Ziyi, Chinese actress and model
* February 11 - Brandy Norwood, American singer
* February 16 - Valentino Rossi, Italian race car driver
* February 21 - Jennifer Love Hewitt, American actress and singer
* March 9 - Melina Perez, American professional wrestler
* March 11 - Benji Madden and Joel Madden, twins from Good Charlotte
* March 12 - Pete Doherty, English singer and guitarist (The Libertines and Babyshambles)
* March 30 - Norah Jones, American musician
* April 4 - Heath Ledger, Australian actor
* April 3 - Daniel Lane, British music journalist (Kerrang!)
* April 8 - Alexi Laiho, Finnish guitarist (Children of Bodom)
* April 10 - Rachel Corrie, American activist (d. 2003)
* April 10 - Tsuyoshi Domoto, Japanese artist
* April 10 - Sophie Ellis-Bextor, English singer
* April 12 - Claire Danes, American actress
* April 18 - Michael Bradley, American basketball player
* April 19 - Kate Hudson, American actress
* April 19 - Antoaneta Stefanova, Bulgarian chess player
* April 28 - Jorge Garcia, American actor
* May 2 - Roman Lyashenko, Russian hockey player (d. 2003)
* May 19 - Laurence V. (Ben) Hicks, American film director and musician
* May 24 - Tracy McGrady, American basketball player
* May 25 - Jonny Wilkinson, English rugby player
* May 26 - Ashley Massaro, American professional wrestler and model
* June 5 - Pete Wentz, American bassist and lyricist (Fall Out Boy)
* June 13 - Nila Håkedal, Norwegian beach volleyball player
* June 23 - LaDainian Tomlinson, American football player
* June 24 - Craig Shergold, British cancer patient
* June 28 - Randy McMichael, American football player
* June 29 - Marleen Veldhuis, Dutch swimmer
* July 3 - Ludivine Sagnier, French model and actress
* July 5 - Amélie Mauresmo, French tennis player
* July 9 - Enav Itamar, Israeli Writer
* July 21 - David Carr, American football player
* July 26 - Johnson Beharry, British war hero
* August 10 - Joanna Garcia, American actress
* August 13 - Taizo Sugimura, Japanese politician
* August 16 - Sarah Balabagan, Filipina prisoner and singer
* August 26 - Jamal Lewis, American football player
* August 28 - Robert Hoyzer, German football referee
* September 13 - Bjørn-Arild Berthelsen, Norwegian Salvation Army soldier
* September 15 - Amy Davidson, American actress
* September 28 - Bam Margera, American skater
* October 1 - Rudi Johnson, American football player
* October 14 - Stacy Keibler, American professional wrestler
* October 17 - Kimi Räikkönen, Finnish race car driver
* October 31 - Keiko Agena, Japanese American actress
* November 6 - Lamar Odom, American basketball player
* November 7 - Jon Peter Lewis, American singer and songwriter
* November 13 - Ron Artest, American basketball player
* December 12 - Nate Clements, American football player
* December 14 - Michael Owen, English footballer
* December 15 - Adam Brody, American actor
* December 17 - William Green, American football player
* December 23 - Summer Altice, American model and actress
* December 27 - Carson Palmer, American football player


Deaths

January-March

* January 3 - Conrad Hilton, American hotelier (b. 1887)
* January 5 - Charles Mingus, American musician (b. 1922)
* January 13 - Donny Hathaway, American musician (b. 1945)
* January 26 - Nelson Rockefeller, Governor of New York, Vice President of the United States (b. 1908)
* February 2 - Sid Vicious, English musician (Sex Pistols) (drug overdose) (b. 1957)
* February 7 - Josef Mengele, Nazi war criminal (b. 1911)
* February 9 - Dennis Gabor, Hungarian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1900)
* February 12 - Jean Renoir, French film director (b. 1894)
* February 14 - Reginald Maudling, British politician (b. 1917)
* February 23 - W.A.C. Bennett, Canadian politician (b. 1900)
* February 28 - Mr. Ed, American talking horse (b. 1949)
* March 1 - Mustafa Barzani, Iraqi Kurdish politician (b. 1903)
* March 19 - Richard Beckinsale, British actor (b. 1947)
* March 28 - Emmett Kelly, American clown (b. 1898)
* March 29 - Sultan Yahya Petra ibni Almarhum Sultan Ibrahim Petra, King of Malaysia (b. 1917)
* March 30 - Airey Neave, British politician (asassinated) (b. 1916)


April-September

* April 4 - Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, President and Prime Minister of Pakistan (executed) (b. 1928)
* April 4 - Edgar Buchanan, American actor (b. 1903)
* April 10 - Nino Rota, Italian composer (b. 1911)
* April 23 - Blair Peach, New Zealand-born anti-Nazi campaigner (killed by police) (b. 1946)
* May 2 - Giulio Natta, Italian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1903)
* May 11 - Barbara Hutton, American socialite (b. 1912)
* May 29 - Mary Pickford, Canadian actress and studio founder (b. 1892)
* June 1 - Werner Forssmann, German physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1904)
* June 11 - John Wayne, American actor (b. 1907)
* June 17 - Duffy Lewis, baseball player (b. 1888)
* June 19 - Paul Popenoe, American eugenicist (b. 1888)
* June 29 - Lowell George, American musician (Little Feat) (b. 1945)
* July 3 - Louis Durey, French composer (b. 1888)
* July 8 - Sin-Itiro Tomonaga, Japanese physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)
* July 8 - Robert B. Woodward, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1917)
* July 10 - Arthur Fiedler, American conductor (b. 1894)
* July 12 - Minnie Riperton, American singer (b. 1947)
* July 16 - Alfred Deller, English countertenor (b. 1912)
* July 22 - Nittatsu Hosoi, Japanese priest (b. 1902)
* July 29 - Bill Todman, American game show producer (b. 1916)
* August 2 - Thurman Munson, baseball player (b. 1947)
* August 3 - Bertil Ohlin, Swedish economist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1899)
* August 6 - Feodor Felix Konrad Lynen, German biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1911)
* August 12 - Ernst Boris Chain, German-born biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine (b. 1906)
* August 27 - Earl Mountbatten, last British Viceroy of India (assassinated) (b. 1900)
* August 31 - Sally Rand, American dancer (b. 1904)
* September - Ismail Nasiruddin Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Zainal Abidin III, King of Malaysia (b. 1907)
* September 8 - Jean Seberg, American actress (b. 1938)
* September 10 - Agostinho Neto, Angolan nationalist (b. 1922)
* September 28 - John Herbert Chapman, Canadian physicist (b. 1921)


October-December

* October 6 - Elizabeth Bishop, American poet (b. 1911)
* October 10 - Christopher Evans, British psychologist and computer scientist (b. 1931)
* October 13 - Rebecca Clarke, English composer and violist (b. 1886)
* October 16 - Johan Borgen, Norwegian author (b. 1903)
* October 22 - Nadia Boulanger, French composer and composition teacher (b. 1887)
* October 26 - Park Chung-hee, President of South Korea (b. 1917)
* November 1 - Mamie Eisenhower, First Lady of the United States (b. 1896)
* November 29 - Zeppo Marx, American actor and comedian (b. 1901)
* December 3 - Dhyan Chand, Indian hockey player (b. 1905)
* December 23 - Peggy Guggenheim, American art collector (b. 1898)
* December 27 - Hafizullah Amin, President of Afghanistan (b. 1929)

Nobel Prizes

* Physics - Sheldon Lee Glashow, Abdus Salam, Steven Weinberg
* Chemistry - Herbert C. Brown, Georg Wittig
* Medicine - Allan M. Cormack, Godfrey N. Hounsfield
* Literature - Odysseas Elytis
* Peace - Mother Teresa
* Economics - Theodore Schultz, Arthur Lewis

Ditto.

One last thing...

March 9, 1976 - Two coal mine explosions claim 26 lives at the Blue Diamond Coal Co. Scotia Mine, Letcher County, Ky

Awesome. All the stuff that happened the year my boy was born, as well.

1977
* January 1 - First woman Episcopal priest ordained.
* January 10 - Major eruption of Mount Nyiragongo in eastern Zaire.
* January 17 - Gary Gilmore executed by a firing squad in Utah
* January 18 - Scientists identify a previously unknown bacterium as the cause of the mysterious "legionnaire's disease"
* January 18 - Australia experiences its worst railway disaster at Granville, near Sydney, in which 83 people died.
* January 19 - President Gerald Ford pardons Iva Toguri D'Aquino (aka "Tokyo Rose").
* January 19 - Snow falls in Miami, Florida. This is the only time in the history of the city that this occurred, and the farthest south a snowfall has been recorded in the United States.
* January 20 - Gerald Rudolph Ford, 38th President of the United States is succeeded by Jimmy Carter.
* January 21 - President Jimmy Carter pardons Vietnam War draft evaders.
* January 27 - Record company EMI sacks the controversial UK punk rock group the Sex Pistols.
* February 7 - The Soviet Union launches Soyuz 24.
* February 11 - A 20.2-kg (44-lb.-9-oz.) lobster is caught off Nova Scotia (heaviest known crustacean).
* February 18 - The Space Shuttle Enterprise test vehicle goes on its maiden "flight" while sitting on top of a Boeing 747.
* March 1 - Sara Lowndes Dylan files for divorce from her husband of 11 years, Bob Dylan
* March 4 - 1977 Bucharest Earthquake - kills more than 1,500
* March 9 - Approximately a dozen armed Hanafi Muslims take over three buildings in Washington, DC, killing one person and taking more than 130 hostages. The hostage situation ends two days later.
* March 27 - A collision between KLM and PanAm Boeing 747s at Tenerife, Canary Islands, kills 583, worst plane crash ever
* April 1 - Hay-on-Wye declares independence
* April 7 - German Federal Prosecutor Siegfried Buback and his driver are shot by two Red Army Faction members while waiting at a red light near his home in Karlsruhe. "The Ulrike Meinhof Commando" later claims responsibility
* April 7 - Toronto Blue Jays play their first-ever game of baseball against the Chicago White Sox
* April 28 - Stuttgart court sentences RAF members Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin and Jan-Carl Raspe to life imprisonment
* May 17 - The Likud lead by Menachem Begin wins the elections in Israel.
* May 23 - Scientists report using bacteria in lab to make insulin
* May 23 - Moluccan terrorists take over a school in Bovensmilde, northern Netherlands (105 hostages) and a passenger train in Bovensmilde-Assen route nearby (90 hostages) at the same time. June 11 Dutch Royal Marines storm the train - six terrorists and two hostages are killed
* May 25 - Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope opens in theaters.
* May 26 - George Willig climbed the South Tower of the World Trade Center.
* May 28 - In Southgate, Kentucky, the Beverly Hills Supper Club is engulfed in fire, killing 165 inside.
* June 5 - A coup takes place in Seychelles.
* June 7 - After campaigning by Anita Bryant and her anti-Gay "Save Our Children" crusade, Dade County, Florida voters overwhelmingly vote to repeal the county's Gay rights ordinance, igniting a wave of violence against Gays across the United States.
* June 6-June 9 - Jubilee celebrations are held in the United Kingdom to celebrate twenty-five years of Elizabeth II's reign.
* June 10 - James Earl Ray escapes from Brushy Mountain State Prison in Petros, Tennessee (he was recaptured on June 13).
* June 15 - Spain has its first democratic elections after 41 years under the Franco regime.
* June 20 - The Supreme Court of the United States rules that states are not required to spend Medicaid funds on elective abortions.
* June 20 - Anglia Television broadcasts fake documentary "Alternative 3". it enters into conspiracy theory canon.
* June 22 - Robert Hillsborough, a Gay San Franciscan, is brutally stabbed to death just steps from his home by four youths, calling him "fag" and "queer" and allegedly shouting "this one's for Anita Bryant".
* June 25 - US man Roy Sullivan in struck by lightning for the 7th time
* June 26 - Some 200,000 Gays march through the streets of San Francisco, protesting Anita Bryant's homophobia and Robert Hillsborough's murder.
* July 4 - Manchester United manager Tommy Docherty is sensationally sacked by the club's directors.
* July 5 - Military coup in Pakistan
* July 13 - The New York City Blackout of 1977 lasts for 25 hours and results in looting and other disorder.
* July 15 - Anti Drugs Campainer Donald Mackay disappears near Griffith N.S.W (New South Wales) presumed Murdered
* July 22 - The purged Chinese communist leader Deng Xiaoping is restored to power as the "Gang of Four" is expelled from the Communist Party of China.
* July 28 - First oil through the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System reaches Valdez, Alaska
* July 30 - Left-wing German terrorists Susanne Albrecht[1], Brigitte Mohnhaupt[2] and a third person assassinate Jürgen Ponto[3], chairman of the Dresdner Bank in Oberursel, West Germany
* August 3 - United States Senate Hearing on MKULTRA.
* August 4 - US President Jimmy Carter signs legislation creating the United States Department of Energy
* August 12 - NASA space shuttle makes its first test flight off the back of a jetliner
* August 15 - The Big Ear, a radio telescope operated by The Ohio State University as part of the SETI project, receives a radio signal from deep space; the event is named the "WOW!" signal for notation made by a volunteer on the project.
* August 16 - Rock singer Elvis Presley dies in Tennessee.
* August 19 - Groucho Marx dies.
* August 19 - Indonesia Earthquake and Tsunami of 1977
* August 20 - Voyager program: The United States launches the Voyager 2 spacecraft
* September 5 - Voyager program: Voyager 1 is launched after a brief delay
* September 5 - Hanns-Martin Schleyer, President of the Employers Association, is kidnapped in Cologne, West Germany. Kidnappers kill three escorting police officers and his chauffeur. They demand release of Red Army Faction prisoners
* September 6 - (approx) - Steve Biko suffers a massive head injury in police custody in South Africa.
* September 7 - Treaties between Panama and the United States on the status of the Panama Canal are signed. The US agrees to transfer control of the canal to Panama at the end of the 20th century
* September 8 - INTERPOL issues a resolution against piracy of video tapes and other material, which is still cited in warnings on videotapes and DVDs now.
* September 10 - Hamida Djandoubi is the last guillotine execution in France.
* September 11 - The last "wild" infection of smallpox is reported in Somalia.
* September 12 - Steve Biko dies of his injuries.
* September 21 - Nuclear-proliferation pact, curbing spread of nuclear weapons, is signed by 15 countries including the United States and USSR.
* September 28 - Porsche 928 debuts at the Geneva Auto Convention
* October 13 - Four Palestinians hijack a Lufthansa Airlines flight to Somalia and demand release of 11 members of the Red Army Faction. See German Autumn
* October 17-October 18 - GSG-9 troopers storm a hijacked Lufthansa passenger plane in Mogadishu, Somalia - three of the four hijackers die
* October 18 - Red Army Faction members Andreas Baader, Jan-Carl Raspe and Gudrun Ensslin commit suicide in Stammheim prison. Irmgard Möller fails. Their supporters continue to claim they were murdered. Bodies are buried October 27
* October 19 - Kidnapped industrialist Hanns-Martin Schleyer is found killed in Mulhoull, France
* October 20 - Three members of rock group Lynyrd Skynyrd die in charter plane crash
* October 21 - The European Patent Institute is founded
* November 6 - The Kelly Barnes Dam, located above Toccoa Falls Bible College near Toccoa, Georgia, fails, killing 39
* November 19 - Egyptian President Anwar Sadat becomes the first Arab leader to officially visit Israel when he meets with Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin and speaks before the Knesset in Jerusalem, seeking a permanent peace settlement (much of the Arab world is outraged by the visit).
* November 22 - British Airways inaugurates regular London to New York City supersonic Concorde service
* December 1 - First flight of Lockheed's top-secret stealth project aircraft designated Have Blue, the precursor to the US F-117A Nighthawk.
* December 4 - Jean-Bédel Bokassa, president of the Central African Republic, crowns himself Emperor.
* December 4 - Malaysia Airlines Flight 653 is hijacked and crashed in Johor, Malaysia, killing 100.

Births
* January 7 - Dustin Diamond, American actor
* January 8 - Amber Benson, American actress
* January 13 - Orlando Bloom, English actor
* January 26 - Vince Carter, American basketball player
* January 28 - Daunte Culpepper, American football player
* January 28 - Joey Fatone, American musician
* February 2 - Shakira, Colombian musician
* February 3 - Daddy Yankee, Latin Reggaeton musician
* February 5 - Ben Ainslie, British sailor
* February 8 - Yucef Merhi, Venezuelan artist
* February 11 - Randy Moss, American football player
* February 11 - Mike Shinoda, American musician
* February 16 - Ian Clarke, Irish computer scientist
* February 20 - Stephon Marbury, American basketball player
* February 21 - Kevin Rose, American television host
* March 1 - Rens Blom, Dutch athlete
* March 5 - Wally Szczerbiak, Spanish-born basketball player
* March 7 - Mitja Zastrow, German-born swimmer
* March 14 - Mervyn Colley, British kabbalist and ceremonial magician
* March 28 - Devon, American actress
* April 13 - Gerard Way, American singer (My Chemical Romance)
* April 14 - Sarah Michelle Gellar, American actress
* April 14 - Chandra Levy, American federal government intern (d. 2001)
* April 21 - Jamie Salé, Canadian figure skater
* April 22 - Andruw Jones, baseball player
* April 23 - John Cena, American professional wrestler
* April 24 - Carlos Beltrán, baseball player
* April 26 - Tom Welling, American actor
* May 13 - Samantha Morton, English actress
* May 14 - Roy Halladay, baseball player
* May 14 - Ada Nicodemou, Australian actress
* May 23 - Ilia Kulik, Russian figure skater
* June 1 - Danielle Harris, American voice actress
* June 8 - Kanye West, American rapper and record producer
* June 9 - Peja Stojakovic, Serbian basketball player
* June 14 - Chris McAlister, American football player
* June 16 - Kerry Wood, baseball player
* June 19 - Peter Warrick, American football player
* June 27 - Raúl, Spanish footballer
* July 1 - Jarome Iginla, Canadian hockey player
* July 1 - Liv Tyler, American actress
* July 8 - Milo Ventimiglia, American actor
* July 8 - Wang Zhizhi, Chinese basketball player
* July 10 - Schapelle Corby, Australian in Indonesian prison
* July 14 - Victoria, Princess of Sweden
* July 27 - Martha Anne Madison, American actress
* July 28 - Emanuel Ginóbili, Argentine basketball player
* July 31 - Tim Couch, American football player
* August 2 - Dave Farrel, American musician
* August 3 - Angela Beesley, British Internet entrepreneur
* August 3 - Tom Brady, American football player
* August 9 - Chamique Holdsclaw, American basketball player
* August 12 - Plaxico Burress, American football player
* August 13 - Michael Klim, Australian swimmer
* August 15 - Igor Cassina, Italian gymnast
* August 17 - Thierry Henry, French footballer
* August 25 - Jonathan Togo, American actor
* August 27 - Deco, Portuguese footballer
* September 1 - Aaron Schobel, American football player
* September 11 - Ludacris, American rapper
* September 13 - Fiona Apple, American musician
* September 28 - Se Ri Pak, Korean golfer
* October 7 - Meighan Desmond, New Zealand actress
* October 11 - Claudia Palacios, Colombian journalist and newsreader
* October 14 - Kelly Schumacher, Canadian basketball player
* October 25 - Birgit Prinz, German footballer
* October 29 - Brendan Fehr, Canadian actor
* November 1 - Alistair Griffin, English singer/songwriter
* November 2 - Randy Harrison, American actor
* November 3 - Aria Giovanni, American model and actress
* November 10 - Brittany Murphy, American actress
* November 13 - Chanel Cole, New Zealand-born singer
* November 16 - Oksana Baiul, Ukrainian figure skater
* November 17 - Ryk Neethling, South African swimmer
* November 19 - Kerri Strug, American gymnast
* November 21 - Jonas Jennings, American football player
* November 28 - DeMya Walker, American basketball player
* December - Ahmed al-Nami, Saudi Arabian hijacker (d. 2001)
* December 3 - Adam Malysz, Polish ski jumper
* December 7 - Fernando Vargas, American boxer
* December 12 - Dahm triplets:
* December 12 - Erica, American model
* December 12 - Jaclyn, American model
* December 12 - Nicole, American model
* December 18 - Ryan Scott Ottney, American comic book writer
* December 23 - Alge Crumpler, American football player
* December 30 - Laila Ali, American boxer
* December 30 - Kenyon Martin, basketball player

Deaths
* January 2 - Errol Garner, American musician (b. 1921)
* January 14 - Anthony Eden, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1897)
* January 14 - Peter Finch, English-born actor (b. 1916)
* January 14 - Anaïs Nin, French author (b. 1903)
* January 17 - Gary Gilmore, American murderer (executed) (b. 1940)
* January 19 - Yvonne Printemps, French singer and actress (b. 1895)
* January 29 - Buster Nupen, South African cricketer (b. 1902)
* January 29 - Freddie Prinze, American actor and comedian (b. 1954)
* February 4 - Brett Halliday, American writer (b. 1904)
* February 11 - Louis Beel, Prime Minister of the Netherlands (b. 1902)
* February 27 - Allison Hayes, American actress (b. 1930)
* February 28 - Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson, American actor (b. 1905)
* March 4 - Andrés Caicedo, Colombian writer (b. 1951)
* March 11 - Ulysses S. Grant IV, American geologist and paleontologist (b. 1893)
* March 16 - Kamal Jumblatt, leader of the Lebanese Druze (b. 1917)
* March 18 - Marien Ngouabi, President of The Republic of the Congo (assassinated) (b. 1938)
* April 21 - Gummo Marx, American actor and comedian (b. 1892)
* May 5 - Ludwig Erhard, Chancellor of Germany (b. 1897)
* May 10 - Joan Crawford, American actress (b. 1905)
* June 3 - Archibald Vivian Hill, English physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1886)
* June 16 - Werner von Braun, German-born rocket scientist (b. 1912)
* June 19 - Lady Olave Baden-Powell, English Chief Girl Guide (b. 1889)
* June 19 - Ali Shariati, Iranian sociologist (b. 1933)
* July 2 - Vladimir Nabokov, Russian-born writer (b. 1899)
* July 13 - Carl Gustav von Rosen, Swedish pilot (b. 1909)
* July 23 - Arsenio Erico, Paraguayan footballer (b. 1915)
* August 4 - Edgar Douglas Adrian, 1st Baron Adrian, English physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1889)
* August 14 - Ron Haydock, American actor, writer, and musician (b. 1940)
* August 16 - Elvis Presley, American singer and actor (b. 1935)
* August 19 - Groucho Marx, American actor and comedian (b. 1890)
* September 1 - Ethel Waters, American singer (b. 1896)
* September 6 - John Edensor Littlewood, British mathematician (b. 1885)
* September 12 - Steve Biko, South African activist (b. 1946)
* September 13 - Leopold Stokowski, English conductor (b. 1882)
* September 16 - Marc Bolan, English musician (b. 1947)
* September 16 - Maria Callas, American-born soprano (b. 1923)
* October 14 - Bing Crosby, American singer and actor (b. 1903)
* October 20 - Members of the American rock group Lynyrd Skynyrd killed in a plane crash:
o Cassie Gaines (b. 1948)
o Steve Gaines (b. 1949)
o Ronnie Van Zant (b. 1948)
* November 5 - René Goscinny, French comic book writer (b. 1926)
* November 8 - Bucky Harris, baseball player (b. 1896)
* November 11 - Greta Keller, Vienna-born cabaret singer and actress (b. 1903)
* November 15 - Princess Charlotte of Monaco (b. 1898)
* November 25 - Tommy Prince, Canadian war hero (b. 1915)
* December 19 - Jacques Tourneur, French director (b. 1904)
* December 25 - Charlie Chaplin, English-born comedian (b. 1889)

[Edited on Dec 03, 2005 by Penfold]

January
January 1 - Brunei becomes a fully independent state.
January 1 - AT&T is broken up into 24 independent units.
January 5 - Richard Stallman starts developing GNU.
January 7 - Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
January 9 - Clara Peller is featured in the "Where's the Beef?" commercial campaign for Wendy's for the first time.
January 10 - The United States and the Vatican establish full diplomatic relations.
January 23 - Hollywood Hulk Hogan defeats The Iron Sheik to win the WWF Championship, thus beginning Hulkamania.
January 23 - Pop star Michael Jackson's scalp is seriously burned by pyrotechnics during filming of a Pepsi commercial.
January 24 - The first Apple Macintosh goes on sale.
[edit]
February
February 1 - Medicare comes into effect in Australia.
February 2 - Melbourne newspaper The Age publishes phone taps incriminating an unknown judge.
February 3 - Space Shuttle Challenger is launched on the tenth space shuttle mission.
February 6 - A bomb blast wrecks the Belrose Sydney home of high court judge Richard Gee. High Court Judge, Justice Lionel Murphy is named in Parliament as the judge referred to in the Age tapes as published on February 2.
February 7 - Astronauts Bruce McCandless II and Robert L. Stewart make the first untethered space walk.
February 9 - Soviet leader Yuri Andropov dies.
February 13 - Konstantin Chernenko succeeds the late Yuri Andropov as general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
February 18 - Vatican and Italian government sign new concordant changing Roman Catholic as the official religion.
February 26 - United States Marines pull out of Beirut,Lebanon.
February 29 - Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau announces his retirement.
[edit]
March
March 5 - Iran accuses Iraq of the use of chemical weapons - UN condemns the use on March 30.
March 5 - Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi orders an attack on the Golden Temple, the Sikh holy spot.
March 6 - Twelve month long strike in British coal industry begins See UK Miners' Strike (1984-1985).
March 14 - Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams and three others are seriously injured in a gun attack by the UVF.
March 16 - The CIA station chief in Beirut, William Buckley, is kidnapped by Islamic fundamentalists Islamic Jihad and later dies in captivity.
March 22 - Teachers at the McMartin preschool in Manhattan Beach, California are charged with Satanic ritual abuse of the children in the school. The charges were later dropped as completely unfounded.
March 23 - Sarah Tisdall, the young British civil servant who told The Guardian newspaper that cruise missiles were coming to Britain, is sentenced to six months imprisonment.
March 24 - Wran Government re-elected in NSW for a 4th term.
[edit]
April
April 4 - President Ronald Reagan calls for an international ban on chemical weapons.
April 12 - Palestinian gunmen take Israeli bus number 300 hostage. Israeli special forces storm the bus freeing the hostages (1 hostage, 2 hijackers killed). 2 other hijackers were captured and then killed in secret service interrogations, causing a major scandal and secret service upheaval (Kav 300 affair).
April 13 - India launches Operation Meghdoot, as most of the Siachen Glacier in Kashmir comes under Indian control.
April 17 - WPC Yvonne Fletcher is shot dead by a secluded gunman during a siege outside the Libyan Embassy in London in the event known as the 1984 Libyan Embassy Siege.
April 19 - Advance Australia Fair is proclaimed as Australia's national anthem, and green and gold as the national colours.
April 25 - End of term for Sultan Haji Ahmad Shah Al-Mustain Billah ibni Almarhum Sultan Sir Abu Bakar Riayatuddin Al-Muadzam Shah as the 7th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia.
April 26 - Baginda Almutawakkil Alallah Sultan Iskandar Al-Haj ibni Almarhum Sultan Ismail, Sultan of Johor becomes the 8th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia.
[edit]
May
May 2 - The Liverpool International Garden Festival opens in Liverpool.
May 8 - The Soviet Union announces that it will boycott the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, California.
May 8 - Denis Lortie kills three government employees in the National Assembly of Quebec building.
May 11 - A transit of Earth from Mars takes place.
May 14 - The one dollar coin is introduced in Australia.
May 19 - Game show contestant Michael Larson takes $100,000 in winnings from the game show Press Your Luck. It is later revealed he won the money by focusing exclusively on two squares of the Press Your Luck "Big Board."
May 22 - Canadian heiress Helen Branch declared legally dead (she disappeared 1977)
May 27 - Fluminense wins the Brazilian soccer league, against the Club de Regatas Vasco da Gama.
[edit]
June
June 5 - The Indian government begins Operation Blue Star, the planned attack on the Golden Temple in Amritsar.
June 6 - Indian troops storm the Golden Temple at Amritsar, the Sikh's holiest shrine, killing an estimated 1000 people.
June 8 - A deadly F5 tornado nearly destroys the town of Barneveld, Wisconsin, killing nine people, injuring nearly 200, and causing over $25m in damage.
June 8 - The film Ghostbusters is released into theaters -- becoming a summer blockbuster hit with the song "Ghostbusters" by Ray Parker Jr. becoming a Top 40 hit.
June 20 - The biggest exam shake-up in the British education system in over 10 years is announced with O-level and CSE exams to be replaced by a new exam, the GCSE.
June 22 - The official name of the Turkish city Urfa is changed into Sanliurfa.
June 22 - Inaugural flight of Virgin Atlantic.
June 27 - France beat Spain 2-0 to win Euro 84.
June 30 - John Turner becomes Canada's seventeenth prime minister.
[edit]
July-August
July 9 - Lightning sets fire to York Minster.
July 10 - British custom officials open a wooden crate of diplomatic post due to an unpleasant smell and find the body of Alhaji Umaru Dikko, former transportation minister of Nigeria
July 18 - In San Ysidro, California, 41-year-old James Oliver Huberty sprays a McDonald's restaurant with gunfire, killing 21 people before being shot dead.
July 18 - The National Crime Authority is estabished in Australia.
July 21 - In Jackson, Michigan, a factory robot crushes a worker against a safety bar in what is apparently the first robot-related death in the United States.
July 23 - Vanessa Williams becomes the first Miss America to resign when she surrenders her crown, after nude photos of her appeared in "Penthouse" magazine.
July 25 - Salyut 7 Cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the first woman to perform a space walk.
July 28 - Opening day of the 1984 Olympics
August 1 - Australian banks are deregulated.
August 4 - The African republic Upper Volta changes its name to Burkina Faso.
August 16 - John De Lorean is acquitted of all eight charges of possessing and distributing cocaine.
August 21 - Half a million people in Manila demonstrate against the regime of Ferdinand Marcos.
August 21 - The federal budget is first televised in Australia.
August 30 - STS-41-D: The Space Shuttle Discovery takes off on its maiden voyage.
[edit]
September-October
September 2 - 7 people are shot dead and 12 are wounded in a bikie shootout between rival gangs Bandidos and Comancheros in the Sydney suburb of Milperra.
September 5 - STS-41-D: The Space Shuttle Discovery lands after its maiden voyage.
September 5 - Western Australia becomes the last Australian state to abolish capital punishment.
September 17 - Brian Mulroney becomes Canada's eighteenth prime minister.
September 26 - United Kingdom and People's Republic of China sign the initial agreement to return Hong Kong to China in 1997.
September 4 - The Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends television series was first broadcasted on ITV.
October 5 - Marc Garneau becomes the first Canadian in space, aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger (41-6).
October 11 - Aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, astronaut Kathryn D. Sullivan becomes the first American woman to perform a space walk.
October 12 - The PIRA attempts to assassinate the British Cabinet in the Brighton hotel bombing.
October 19 - Polish secret police arrests Jerzy Popiełuszko, a Catholic priest, because of his support of the Solidarity movement. His dead body is found in a reservoir 11 days later on October 30.
October 31 - Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi is assassinated by two Sikh security guards. Riots soon broke out in New Delhi, and some 2,700 innocent Sikhs were killed.
[edit]
November
November 2 - Capital punishment: Velma Barfield becomes the first woman executed in the United States since 1962.
November 6 - Ronald Reagan defeats Walter F. Mondale in the U.S. presidential election with 59% of the popular vote, the highest since Richard Nixon's 61% victory in 1972. Reagan carries 49 states and Mondale manages to win only his home state of Minnesota by a mere 3,761 vote margin and the District of Columbia, an automatic given.
November 19 - A series of explosions at the PEMEX petroleum storage facility at San Juan Ixhuatepec in Mexico City ignites a major fire and kills about 500 people.
November 25 - 36 of Britain and Ireland's top pop musicians gathered in a Notting Hill studio to form Band Aid and recorded the song "Do They Know It's Christmas" in order to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia.
November 26 - Fmr NSW Corrective Services Minister Rex Jackson appears in court on conspiracy charges for the early release of prisoners.
November 28 - Over 250 years after their deaths, William Penn and his wife Hannah Callowhill Penn are made Honorary Citizens of the United States.
November 30 - The Tamil Tigers begin the purge of the Sinhalese from North and East Sri Lanka, and 127 are killed.
[edit]
December
December 1 - The first half of the Manila LRT opens from Baclaran to Central Terminal.
December 2 - Bob Hawke's government is re-elected in Australia with a reduced majority.
December 3 - Bhopal Disaster: A methyl isocyanate leak from a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India, kills more than 2,000 people outright and injures anywhere from 150,000 to 600,000 others (some 6,000 of whom would later die from their injuries) in one of the worst industrial disasters in history.
December 3 - British Telecom privatised.
December 19 - The People's Republic of China and United Kingdom signs the Sino-British Joint Declaration which concerns the future of Hong Kong.
December 22 - Four African-American youths, Barry Allen, Troy Canty, James Ramseur, and Darrell Cabey, board an express train in The Bronx borough of New York City. They attempt to rob Bernhard Hugo Goetz, who shoots them. The event starts a national debate about urban crime, which was a plague in 1980s America.
December 22 - In Malta, prime minister Dom Mintoff resigns. Karmenu Mifsud-Bonnici succeeds him.
December 28 - A Soviet cruise missile plunges into Inarinjärvi lake in Finnish Lapland. Finnish authorities announce the fact in public on January 3, 1985
December 31 - Rajiv Gandhi becomes prime minister of India.

^^^ Wow, Hulkamania? AWESOME!

What happened in 1978?

I was born.

What else is there?

My birthday is the same day as the Jonestown suicide?


All of a sudden, my life makes so much more sense.

My sister was born in '78. All she knows about the year she was born is to do with Sid and Nancy...

Also in 1971 - These are just highlights from Wikipedia! I tried to keep it shortish!

January 2 - 66 die in stairway crush at Rangers v Celtic football match, Glasgow, Scotland.
January 2 - A ban on television cigarette advertisements goes into effect in the United States.
January 7 - Howard Hughes breaks his silence to announce that his supposed biography is a forgery.
February 4 - In Britain, Rolls Royce goes bankrupt - state takes over
February 8 - A new stock market index called the Nasdaq debuts
February 9 - The 6.4 on the Richter Scale Sylmar earthquake hits the San Fernando Valley area of California.
February 9 - Satchel Paige becomes the first Negro League player to become voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame
February 11 - US, UK, USSR, others sign Seabed Treaty outlawing nuclear weapons.February 15 – Angry Belgian farmers crash the EEC meeting in Brussels with three live cows with them LOL
February 20 – 50 tornadoes rage in Mississippi – 74 dead
March 1 - Bomb explodes in men's room in the White House - Weather Underground claims responsibility.
April 24 – 500,000 people in Washington DC and 125,000 in San Francisco march against the Vietnam War
April 24 - Tsunami 85 m high rises over Ryukyu Islands in Japan. It throws a 750-ton block of coral 2.5 km inland
June 30 - After a successful mission aboard Salyut 1, the world's first manned space station, the crew of the Soyuz 11 spacecraft are killed when their air supply leaks out through a faulty valve
July 3 - Jim Morrison in found dead in his Paris apartment
October 1 - Walt Disney World opens.

Ray Tomlinson sends the first e-mail.
Libertarian party established in USA.
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism established.

Births
January 7 - Chavo Guerrero Jr., American professional wrestler
January 8 - Jason Giambi, baseball player
January 11 - Mary J. Blige, American singer
January 17 - Kid Rock, American singer
January 19 - Shawn Wayans, American actor, writer, and producer
February 25 - Sean Astin, American actor
February 26 - Erykah Badu, American singer
March 11 - Johnny Knoxville, American television personality
March 31 - Ewan McGregor, Scottish actor
April 1 - Method Man, American rapper
April 12 - Shannon Doherty, American actress
June 16 - Tupac Shakur, American rapper, poet, and actor (d. 1996)
July 1 - Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott, American singer
July 12 - Kristi Yamaguchi, American figure skater
August 12 - Pete Sampras, American tennis player
August 17 - Jorge Posada, Puerto Rican Major League Baseball player
September 18 - Lance Armstrong, American cyclist
October 25 - Pedro Martínez, Dominican Major League Baseball player
October 25 - Midori, Japanese violinist
October 29 - Winona Ryder, American actress
December 24 - Ricky Martin, Puerto Rican singer

Deaths
January 10 - Coco Chanel, French fashion designer (b. 1883)
April 6 - Igor Stravinsky, Russian composer (b. 1882)
April 21 - Papa Doc Duvalier, President of Haiti (b. 1907)
May 1 - Violet Jessop, Titanic survivor (b. 1887)
May 19 - Ogden Nash, American poet (b. 1902)
June 30 - Crew of Soyuz 11:
Georgi Dobrovolski (b. 1928)
Viktor Patsayev (b. 1933)
Vladislav Volkov (b. 1935)
July 3 - Jim Morrison, American singer, songwriter, and poet (b. 1943)
July 6 - Louis Armstrong, American jazz trumpeter (b. 1901)

...as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

1967 News
News Headlines
#
Communist China Announces It Has H-bomb
#
Christiaan Barnard Performs First Heart Transplant in Captown South Africa
#
US Bombers Raid Hanoi
#
Svetlana Alliluyeva, Stalin's Daughter Defects To West
#
Newark Black Riots End After Six Days 26 Dead
#
Detroit Riots End after 8 Days 43 Dead
#
3 Astronauts Die In Apollo I Fire On Launch Pad
#
US Suffers highest Weekly Casualties
#
Draft Board Refuses Exemption For Ali
#
Man Said To Be Boston Strangler Is Recaptured
#
Stalin's Daughter Defects
#
Dr. Christian Barnard Does First Heart Transplant In Cape Town South Africa

In The News
#
Troop level in Vietnam reaches 525,000
#
Anti War protesters make night march to Pentagon
#
Expo "67" opens in Montreal
#
Dow high 943 low 786
#
Rene Favaloro, Cleveland Clinic develops first coronary bypass operation
#
Ali won't serve, loses title
#
Israel smashes Arabs in six day war
#
Jane Mansfield dies in car crash

that was the day after I was born

Who Shot JR? is talked about heavily from the TV show Dallas. On November 21, the conclusion draws more viewers than any other show in TV history up to that point.

Summer Olympics in Moscow, USSR, The US boycotts

Post-It Notes are introduced by 3-M

John Lennon is assassinated by Mark David Chapman

Brook Shields whispers, You know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing." the ad was banned.

Ronald Reagan is elected, defeating Jimmy Carter, and takes credit for freeing the Iranian hostages in his innaugural speech.

Mt. Saint Helens erupts, killing 60 people.

CNN is launched as the first all news network

Small pox is considered eradicated by the World Health Orginization.

Sadam Hussein launches war against Iran for close to a decade over oil rights.

Japan passes the US as the largest automaker

Bill Gates licenses MS-DOS to IBM, makes next to nothing on the deal. The pair buys the rights to a simple operating system manufactured by Seattle Computer Products and use it as a template. The money is made later from licensing it to third party clone makers.

President Carter attempted a helicopter rescue of the hostages in Iran, failing miserably.

US hockey team beat Russia for the gold in the Winter Olympics.

way to kill a thread - paste every single friggin event from Wikipedia or whatever.

People - try to narrow it down with a little account of 1 or 2 significant things that happened. Thank you.

I was born on 2/7/64. Midnight in New York. The Beatles landed at JFK a few hours later, for their Ed Sullivan appearances.

1980: Richard Nixon was assassinated at the Phantageous theatre in Toronto.