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Shortly after 4am on 5 September 1972, eight heavily
armed militants from Black September, a faction of the PLO, arrived on the outskirts of Munich and scaled a perimeter fence
protecting thousands of athletes sleeping in the Olympic Village.
Carrying assault rifles and grenades, the Palestinians
ran towards No 31 Connollystrasse, the building housing the Israeli delegation to the Munich Olympic Games. Bursting into
the first apartment, they took a group of Israeli officials and trainers hostage: Yossef Gutfreund, Amitzur Shapira, Kehat
Shorr, Andrei Spitzer, Jacov Springer and Moshe Weinberg.
In another apartment, they captured the Israeli wrestlers
and weightlifters Eliezer Halfin, Yossef Romano, Mark Slavin, David Berger (an Israeli-American law graduate) and Zeev Friedman.
When the tough Israelis fought back, the Palestinians opened fire, shooting Romano and Weinberg dead. The other nine were
subdued and taken hostage. The Palestinians then demanded the release of 234 prisoners held in Israeli jails.
So
began a siege and a tragedy that remains one of the most significant terror attacks of modern times. The assault, and the
nature of the Israeli response, thrust the Israeli-Palestinian crisis into the world spotlight, set the tone for decades of
conflict in the Middle East, and launched the new era of international terrorism.
Mother Teresa (26 August 1910 – 5 September 1997),
born Agnesë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu (pronounced [ans ndʒe bjadʒiu]), was an Albanian Catholic nun with Indian
citizenship who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata (Calcutta), India in 1950. For over 45 years she ministered
to the poor, sick, orphaned, and dying, while guiding the Missionaries of Charity's expansion, first throughout India
and then in other countries. Following her death she was beatified by Pope John Paul II and given the title Blessed Teresa
of Calcutta.
By the 1970s she was internationally famed as a humanitarian and advocate for the poor and helpless,
due in part to a documentary and book Something Beautiful for God by Malcolm Muggeridge. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in
1979 and India's highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, in 1980 for her humanitarian work. Mother Teresa's Missionaries
of Charity continued to expand, and at the time of her death it was operating 610 missions in 123 countries, including hospices
and homes for people with HIV/AIDS, leprosy and tuberculosis, soup kitchens, children's and family counselling programs,
orphanages, and schools.
Chaos, unrest, and panic broke out as hysterical South
Vietnamese officials and civilians scrambled to leave Saigon. Martial law was declared. American helicopters began evacuating
South Vietnamese, U.S., and foreign nationals from various parts of the city and from the U.S. embassy compound. Operation
Frequent Wind had been delayed until the last possible moment, because of U.S. Ambassador Graham Martin's belief that
Saigon could be held and that a political settlement could be reached.
Schlesinger announced early in the morning
of 29 April 1975 the evacuation from Saigon by helicopter of the last U.S. diplomatic, military, and civilian personnel. Frequent
Wind was arguably the largest helicopter evacuation in history. It began on 29 April, in an atmosphere of desperation, as
hysterical crowds of Vietnamese vied for limited seats. Martin pleaded with Washington to dispatch $700 million in emergency
aid to bolster the regime and help it mobilize fresh military reserves. But American public opinion had soured on this conflict
halfway around the world.
In the U.S., South Vietnam was perceived as doomed. President Gerald Ford had given a
televised speech on 23 April, declaring an end to the Vietnam War and all U.S. aid. Frequent Wind continued around the clock,
as North Vietnamese tanks breached defenses on the outskirts of Saigon. The song "White Christmas" was broadcast
as the final signal for withdrawal. In the early morning hours of 30 April, the last U.S. Marines evacuated the embassy by
helicopter, as civilians swamped the perimeter and poured into the grounds. Many of them had been employed by the Americans
and were left to their fate.
On 30 April 1975, VPA troops overcame all resistance, quickly capturing key buildings
and installations. A tank crashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace, and at 11:30 a.m. local time the NLF flag
was raised above it. Thieu's successor, President Duong Van Minh, attempted to surrender, but VPA officers informed him
that he had nothing left to surrender. Minh then issued his last command, ordering all South Vietnamese troops to lay down
their arms.
The Communists had attained their goal: they had toppled the Saigon regime. But the cost of victory
was high. In the past decade alone, one Vietnamese in every ten had been a casualty of war—nearly a million and a half
killed, three million wounded.
By war's end, the Vietnamese had been fighting foreign involvement or occupation
(primarily by the French, Chinese, Japanese, British, and American governments) for 116 years.
Quick jump to other pages!
Computer engineer, Ray Tomlinson invented internet based
email in late 1971. Under ARPAnet several major innovations occurred: email (or electronic mail), the ability to send
simple messages to another person across the network (1971). Ray Tomlinson worked as a computer engineer for Bolt Beranek
and Newman (BBN), the company hired by the United States Defense Department to build the first Internet in 1968.
Ray Tomlinson was experimenting with a popular program he wrote called SNDMSG that the ARPANET programmers and researchers
were using on the network computers (Digital PDP-10s) to leave messages for each other. SNDMSG was a "local" electronic
message program. You could only leave messages on the computer that you were using for other persons using that computer to
read. Tomlinson used a file transfer protocol that he was working on called CYPNET to adapt the SNDMSG program so it could
send electronic messages to any computer on the ARPANET network.
The @ Symbol
Ray Tomlinson chose the @ symbol
to tell which user was "at" what computer. The @ goes inbetween the user's login name and the name of his/her
host computer.
First Email
The first email was sent between two computers that were actually sitting besides
each other. However, the ARPANET network was used as the connection between the two. The first email message was "QWERTYUIOP".
Ray Tomlinson is quoted as saying he invented email,"Mostly because it seemed like a neat idea." No one
was asking for email.
The Munich massacre is an informal name for events that
occurred during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany, when members of the Israeli Olympic team were taken hostage
and eventually murdered by Black September, a militant group with ties to Yasser Arafat’s Fatah organization. The commando
operation was officially named "Ikrit and Biram", after two Christian Palestinian villages whose inhabitants
had been killed or expelled by the Hagannah in 1948.
By the end of the ordeal, the terrorists had killed eleven
Israeli athletes and coaches and one West German police officer. Five of the eight members of Black September were killed
by police officers during a failed rescue attempt. The three surviving terrorists were captured, but later released by West
Germany following the hijacking by Black September of a Lufthansa airliner. Israel responded to the massacre with Operation
Spring of Youth and Operation Wrath of God, as well as a series of airstrikes and assassinations of those suspected of planning
the kidnappings.
The Beatles' breakup describes the events related
to the breakup of The Beatles, one of the most popular and influential musical groups in history. The breakup has become
almost as much of a legend as the band itself or the music they created while together. The Beatles were active from
their formation in 1960 to the disintegration of the group in 1970.
There were numerous causes for the Beatles'
breakup. It was not a single event but a long transition, including the cessation of touring in 1966, and the death of their
manager, Brian Epstein, in 1967, meaning The Beatles were personally involved in financial and legal conflicts.
Conflict
arose from differences between each member's artistic vision. Both George Harrison and Ringo Starr temporarily 'left'
the group at various points during 1968-1969 and all four band members had begun working on solo projects by 1970 as the appeal
of working together as a group began to wane. Ultimately, animosity made it impossible for the group to continue working together
and Paul McCartney made the breakup public knowledge as part of the press release for his first solo album, McCartney.
Although there were sporadic collaborative recording efforts among the band members (most notably Starr's Ringo,
1973 being the only time that the four have—albeit on separate tracks—appeared on the same album post-breakup),
all four Beatles never simultaneously collaborated as a recording or performing group ever again while all four members were
alive, and Starr's 1976 album Ringo's Rotogravure album is the last post-breakup album to which all four Beatles contribute
and are credited on the same album: besides Ringo's drumming and song writing contributions, Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison
are all credited with composing one track apiece. After John Lennon's death in 1980, McCartney, Harrison, and Starr reconvened
for Harrison's "All Those Years Ago". The trio reunited as The Beatles for the Anthology project in 1994; using
the two unfinished Lennon demos "Free as a Bird" and "Real Love" for what would be the last two songs
under The Beatles name.
In 1977 the film Saturday Night Fever was released.
The film was marketed specifically to broaden disco's popularity beyond its primarily gay and black audience. It was a
huge success, helping to make disco a worldwide phenomenon. In December 1977, it became the best-selling soundtrack of all
time. Disco's popularity led many non-disco artists to record disco songs at the height of its popularity.
Many of these songs were not "pure" disco, but were instead rock or pop songs with (sometimes inescapable) disco
influence or overtones. Notable examples include Blondie's ""Heart of Glass" (1978), Barry Manilow’s
"Copacabana" (1978),David Bowie "John I'm Only Dancing (Again)" (1975), Rod Stewart's "Da
Ya Think I'm Sexy?" (1979), Electric Light Orchestra’s "Shine a Little Love" and "Last Train
to London" (1979), George Benson's "Give Me the Night" (1980), Queen's "Another One Bites the
Dust" (1980), Paul McCartney & Wings' "Goodnight Tonight" (1979), Pink Floyd's "Another Brick
in the Wall (part II)" (1979), and KISS' "I Was Made For Lovin' You" (1979).
The Rubik's Cube is a 3-D mechanical puzzle invented
in 1974 by Hungarian sculptor and professor of architecture Ernő Rubik. Originally called the "Magic Cube",
the puzzle was licensed by Rubik to be sold by Ideal Toys in 1980 and won the German Game of the Year special award for Best
Puzzle that year. As of January 2009, 350 million cubes have sold worldwide making it the world's top-selling puzzle game.
It is widely considered to be the world's best-selling toy.
In a classic Rubik's Cube, each of the six
faces is covered by 9 stickers, among six solid colours (traditionally white, red, blue, orange, green, and yellow). A pivot
mechanism enables each face to turn independently, thus mixing up the colours. For the puzzle to be solved, each face must
be a solid colour. Similar puzzles have now been produced with various numbers of stickers, not all of them by Rubik. The
original 3×3×3 version celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary in 2005.
The red telephone
box, a public telephone kiosk designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, is a familiar sight on the streets of the United Kingdom,
Malta and Gibraltar, and despite a reduction in their numbers in recent years, red boxes can still be seen in many places.
The rainy British climate necessitates protection of callers from the elements. The colour red was chosen to make them easy
to spot.
The perception
of the established institutions of nuclear family, religion and trust in one's government continued to lose ground during
this time. Major developments of the sexual revolution included the awareness of the impact of contraceptive pills on social-interactional
relationships, and an increase in divorce rates, single parent households, and pre-marital sex. By the end of the decade,
the feminist movement had helped change women's working conditions. The Gay Rights movement became prominent, and the
hippie culture, which started in the 1960s, peaked in the early 1970s and carried on through the end of the decade. The United
States' withdrawal from its extensive military involvement in Vietnam and the resignation of Richard Nixon helped bring
about a sense of malaise and mistrust in political authority.
The United States experienced an economic recession, but
the economy of Japan prospered. The economies of many third world countries continued to make steady progress in the early
1970s, because of the green revolution. They might have thrived and become stable in the way that Europe recovered after the
war through the Marshall Plan; however, their economic growth was slowed by the oil crisis. 
Women were finally
entitled to equal pay (whether they got it or not was a different matter), the first kidney transplant was televised and dog
spectacles were patented.
Womblemania hit Britain, and building blocks had never been so much fun. Lego was Toy of the
Year for the second year running and parents had to get used to finding lumps of plastic embedded in their bruised feet.
The wedge-shaped Lotus Esprit, which later found fame as James Bonds ride in "For Your Eyes Only", was launched.
Sadly conventional models would not operate under water.
The pop video was born. A seven minute rock opera complete
with dodgy visuals gave Freddie Mercurys Queen their first number one single, "Bohemian Rhapsody".
The world
was in danger of exploding in a burst of static as polyester ruled disco fashion. Only animals wore fur, as lobbyists took
to throwing blood or paint over wealthy women draped in dead fox or mink.
The first ethos
of the 1970s emerged from a transition of the global social structure. It reflected the transition from the decline of colonial
imperialism since the end of World War II to globalization and the rise of a new middle class in the developing world.
Globally, the 1970s had several features that were similar and definitive across economic levels and regions. These aspects
and essence that make up global essence of the 1970s are the defining points of the 1970s: the Bretton Woods system and its
subsequent failure, the impact of the contraceptive pill on social-interactional dynamics, the rising of the Black community
and the oil shock of 1973.
John Lennon and Yoko Ono made history when they slept their way into the hearts of fans in a daring
and provocative peace protest in 1969. The famous pair shocked conservative viewers and were lionized by supporters as they
spent a week in their pyjamas in a Montreal hotel room bed in support of world peace. In this fabulous and unedited
footage supporters and opponents stop by the room to help or duke it out.
Other common
global ethos of the seventies world include: increasingly flexible and varied gender roles for women. More women could enter
the work force rather than remain housewives. However, the gender role of men remained as that of a bread-winner. The period
also saw unprecedented socioeconomic impact of an ever-increasing number of women entering the non-agrarian economic workforce,
and the sweeping cultural-religious impact of the Iranian revolution toward the end of the 1970s.
The global
experience of the cultural transition of the 1970s and an experience of a global zeitgeist revealed the interdependence of
economies since World War II, and showed the huge impact of American economic policies on the world.
The 1970s was
perhaps the worst decade of Western and American economic performance since the Great Depression. Although there was no severe
economic depression as witnessed in the 1930s, economic growth rates were considerably lower than previous decades. As a result,
the 1970s adversely distinguished itself from the prosperous postwar period between 1945 and 1968. Then, the world economy
was buoyed by the Marshall Plan and the robust American economy. However, the high standing enjoyed by the American economy
gradually became discomposed by years of loose domestic spending (particularly the Great Society campaign) and funding for
the Vietnam war. The oil shocks of 1973 and 1979 added to the existing ailments and conjured high inflation throughout much
of the world for the rest of the decade. Soaring oil prices compelled most American businesses to raise their prices as well,
with inflationary results.
The average annual inflation rate from 1900 to 1970 was approximately 2.5 percent. From 1970,
however, the average rate hit about 6 percent, topping out at 13.3 percent by 1979. This period is also known for "stagflation",
a phenomenon in which inflation and unemployment steadily increased, therefore leading to double-digit interest rates that
rose to unprecedented levels (above 12% per year). The prime rate hit 21.5 in December 1980, the highest in history. By the
time of 1980, when President Jimmy Carter was running for re-election against Ronald Reagan, the misery index (the sum of
the unemployment rate and the inflation rate) had reached an all-time high of 21.98 percent.
In Eastern Europe, Soviet-style
command economies began showing signs of stagnation, in which successes were persistently dogged by setbacks. The oil shock
increased East European, particularly Soviet, exports, but agriculture became a growing annoyance to such economies.
In the United
Kingdom, color channels were now available; three stations had begun broadcasting in color between 1967 and 1969. Notable
UK dramas included Play for Today and Pennies From Heaven. The science fiction show Doctor Who reached its peak. Many popular
British situation comedies (sit-coms) were gentle, innocent, unchallenging comedies of middle-class life; typical examples
were Terry and June, Sykes, and The Good Life. A more diverse view of society was offered by series like Porridge and Rising
Damp. In police dramas there was a move towards increasing realism; popular shows included Dixon of Dock Green, Softly, Softly,
and The Sweeney.
In the 1970s,
the renegade sports leagues of the National Basketball Association (founded in 1946), the World Hockey Association (lasting
from 1972 through 1979), and the World Series Cricket (lasting from 1977 to 1979) challenged older, established organizations.
The "Battle of the Sexes" tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs, who proclaimed the women's
game to be inferior, was a turning point in sports during the decade; after King's victory, the match was heralded as
a major victory for women in athletics. The 1970s marked a boom in the popularity of distance running, especially in the United
States. The 1972 Summer Olympics were marred by terrorism and Cold War-related international controversy. Among the competition's
highlights was the performance of swimmer Mark Spitz, who set seven World Records to win a record seven gold medals in one
Olympics, bringing his total to nine. The 1976 Summer Olympics were highlighted by the legendary performance of Romanian female
gymnast Nadia Comaneci and the strong U.S. boxing team.
Seventies clothing holds its own special place in American
culture. Ranging from late 60's hippie looks to the eye popping styles of the disco era, 70's clothes were not
designed to be ignored. The decade of the 1970s began as a carry over of late '60s fashion. The hippie influence
was still very present. Shirts of tie dye and worn jeans were the look of the day. Hip huggers and bell bottom
jeans were popular and were likely to be customized and decorated by the person wearing them. Donning patches and using
a variety of bleaching and tie dying techniques was popular. Jean jackets of the day were often stylized by their owners
with a variety of patches carrying whatever message the wearer felt like sharing.
Young women of the day could
be quite unpredictable in their choice of fashion. The same girl wearing torn and faded jeans might next be seen in
"hot pants" accompanied by long knee socks or wearing a floral patterned granny dress, all on top of very high and
clunky looking heels. Women were asserting themselves in fashion and it was difficult to miss. The mini skirt
was still alive and well but "midi" dresses that came to the mid calf region and ankle length "maxi" dresses
were also popular, especially in more formal situations. You never knew what to expect.
The Post Punk movement that originated in the late 1970s
both supported Punk Rock's rule breaking while rejecting its back to raw rock music element. Post Punk's mantra of
constantly moving forward lent itself to both openness to and experimentation with elements of disco and other styles. Public
Image Limited is considered the first Post Punk group. The groups second album Metal Box fully embraced the studio as instrument
methodology of disco. The groups founder John Lydon told the press that disco was the only music he cared for at the time.
No Wave was a sub genre of post punk centered in New York City. For shock value, James Chance who was a notable member of
the No Wave scene penned an article in the East Village Eye urging his readers to move uptown and get "trancin' with
some superadioactive disco voodoo funk". His band James White and the Blacks wrote a disco album Off White. Their performances
resembled those of disco performers (horn section, dancers etc). In 1981 ZE Records led the transition from No Wave into the
more subtle Mutant disco (post-disco/punk) genre. Mutant disco acts such as Kid Creole and the Coconuts, Was Not Was,
ESG and Liquid Liquid influenced several British Post Punk acts such as New Order, Orange Juice and A Certain Ratio
In April 1975, Dahl was in a bar listening to his friends
complain about their pets. This gave him the idea for the perfect "pet": a rock. A rock would not need to be fed,
walked, bathed, groomed and would not die, become sick, or be disobedient. He said they were to be the perfect pets, and joked
about it with his friends. However, he eventually took the idea seriously, and went home and drafted an "instruction
manual" for a pet rock. It was full of puns, gags and plays on words that referred to the rock as an actual pet.
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When journalist Tom Wolfe (1931–) surveyed the
changes that had swept America in the past few years, he gave the decade a label that has stuck: “The Me Decade.”
Wolfe and others noticed that the dominant concerns of most people had shifted from issues of social and political justice
that were so important in the 1960s to a more selfish focus on individual well-being. What was behind this sudden change in
the American mood? Economic and political shifts help to explain much of the change. From the end of the World War II (1939–45)
until the end of the 1960s, the American economy had enjoyed one of its longest extended periods of growth. That growth came
screeching to a halt in the 1970s, and matters got worse as the decade continued. An Arab oil embargo halted shipments of
oil to the United States, forcing gas prices to raise dramatically and forcing rationing. Another oil crisis in 1979 continued
the economic shock. The automobile industry was hit hard by the oil crises and by competition from carmakers in Japan. To
make economic matters worse, inflation was rising, which meant that the relative prices of goods were climbing faster than
wages were. Many Americans turned inward and focused their attention on their economic problems rather than on problems of
politics or social justice.
Politics in the 1970s were very different from in the 1960s as well. Presidents John F. Kennedy
(1917–1963) and Lyndon B Johnson (1908–1972) had led popular crusades to use the government for public good. President
Richard M. Nixon (1913–1994) became a symbol of the public’s mistrust of politicians. He was forced from office
in 1974 after the public learned of his involvement in the cover up of a break-in at the watergate office complex. The Watergate
scandal revealed the Nixon 948 administration to be devious and corrupt..
Star Wars is an epic space opera franchise conceived
by George Lucas. The first film in the franchise was originally released on May 25, 1977, by 20th Century Fox, and became
a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, spawning two immediate sequels, released at three-year intervals. Sixteen years after
the release of the trilogy's final film, the first in a new prequel trilogy of films was released, again released at three-year
intervals, with the final film released on May 19, 2005.
As of 2008, the overall box office revenue generated by
the six Star Wars films has totalled approximately $4.3 billion, making it the third-highest-grossing film series, behind
only the James Bond and Harry Potter films.
The Star Wars film series has spawned other media including books,
television series, video games, and comic books. These supplements to the film trilogies comprise the Star Wars Expanded Universe,
and have resulted in significant development of the series' fictional universe. These media kept the franchise going in
the interim between the film trilogies. In 2008, Star Wars: The Clone Wars was released to theaters as the first ever worldwide
theatrical Star Wars film outside of the main trilogies. It was the franchise's first animated film, and was intended
as an introduction to the Expanded Universe series of the same name, a 3D CGI animated series based on a previous 2D animated
series of a similar name.
Viking 1 was the first of two spacecraft sent to Mars
as part of NASA's Viking program. It was the first spacecraft to successfully land on Mars and perform its mission,
and holds the record for the longest Mars surface mission of 6 years and 116 days (from landing until surface mission termination,
Earth time). The instruments of the orbiter consisted of two vidicon cameras for imaging (VIS), an infrared spectrometer
for water vapor mapping (MAWD) and infrared radiometers for thermal mapping (IRTM). The orbiter primary mission
ended at the beginning of solar conjunction on November 5, 1976. The extended mission commenced on December 14, 1976 after
solar conjunction. Operations included close approaches to Phobos in February 1977. The periapsis was reduced to 300 km on
March 11, 1977. Minor orbit adjustments were done occasionally over the course of the mission, primarily to change the walk
rate — the rate at which the planetocentric longitude changed with each orbit, and the periapsis was raised to 357 km
on July 20, 1979. On August 7, 1980 Viking 1 Orbiter was running low on altitude control gas and its orbit was raised from
357 × 33943 km to 320 × 56000 km to prevent impact with Mars and possible contamination until the year 2019. Operations
were terminated on August 17, 1980 after 1485 orbits.
US president Nixon resigned over the Watergate scandal.
They worked tirelessly at their goal and were soon rewarded
with another job in the following election year: derailing the Democratic ticket. On June 17, 1972 a group of men broke into
the DNC Headquarters to find what they could and to bug the offices. A sharp-eyed security officer saw the break in, called
the police and the burglars were quickly taken into custody. Over the next few days and months, amazing insights into these
men came out. One of the burglars used to be a GOP security aide, another was found to have a 25,000$ check that was supposed
to have gone to Nixon’s re-election campaign. In fact, it turned out that all of the burglars were on the payroll of
the Committee to Re-Elect the President (C.R.E.E.P.).
As this unfolded, Nixon went on to win the presidential election
in one of the biggest landslides in history. It would be Nixon’s last big win. Following his re-election the repercussions
from the Watergate break-in grew larger. Several of the burglars went to jail. As the connection between these burglars and
the Republican White House grew stronger, several White House staffers were forced to resign and White House Chief Counsel
John Dean resigned.
Rumors swirled about the break-in, the similar events that many believed had also occurred
and Nixon’s involvement in it all. In May of 1973 the Senate opened up hearings on the Watergate break-in and under
intense pressure, Nixon had Archibald Cox appointed as Special Prosecutor to the case.
The Senate investigation
went forward and immediately became damaging to the President in June as John Dean became the first (former) White House staff
member to admit that he had discussions with the President concerning Watergate and how to cover it up. In July things got
worse as it was revealed in the Senate hearings that Nixon had a sophisticated taping system set up in the Oval Office with
which he had taped all of his conversations. The Senate Committee and Special Prosecutor Cox immediately requested that Nixon
hand those tapes over. Citing everything from National Security to Executive Privilege, Nixon refuses to hand over the tapes.
The pressure on Nixon continued to grow strong, so much so that on October 20, 1973 he was moved to commit the ‘Saturday
Night Massacre’. Unable to shake Cox’s pressure, Nixon contacted Attorney General Elliott Richardson and ordered
him to fire Cox. Richardson refused and was himself immediately fired. Nixon then turned to the Assistant Attorney General
to fire Cox. He too refused and was fired. Nixon finally found someone who would fire Cox but the resulting backlash forced
Nixon to have a new Special Prosecutor appointed. Leon Jaworski was given that task and immediately began pressing Nixon to
hand over the tapes.
Throughout the rest of 1973 the country stood by breathlessly as Nixon, the Senate and the
prosecutors went round and round. First Nixon said that one of the key tapes which the prosecutors wanted had an 18 ½
minute gap on it, then Nixon tried to send written (and heavily edited) transcripts of many of the taped conversations in
lieu of the actual tapes. The pressure continued to be placed on Nixon though to hand over the tapes.
In July of
1974 Jaworski had no other choice but to name Nixon as an un-indicted co-conspirator in the obstruction of justice over the
Watergate matter. Nixon continued to claim Executive Privilege in his refusals to hand the materials over. The matter was
taken up by the Supreme Court who unanimously rejected Nixon’s argument and ordered that he turn the tapes over. When
he refused, the House of Representatives, three days later, voted to impeach the President.
Nixon now realized
that he was into a corner from which there was only one way out and so it was that on August 8, 1974 Richard M. Nixon became
the first United States President to resign. Gerald Ford, who had become Vice President upon the resignation of Nixon’s
Original VP Spiro T. Agnew, assumed the highest office of the land. Days after becoming President, Ford pardoned Nixon completely.
Nixon was the only ‘Watergate conspirator’ who spent no time in jail.
The lessons learned by these
events are enormous. The story of Watergate is a complex and deep one full of intrigue and back room deals, public politics
and personal motivations. It is a deeply American event that touched the world.
Idi Amin (also known as Idi Amin Dada) was the nutty,
ruthless dictator of the African nation of Uganda during the 1970s. He started out as a soldier in the British colonial army
in 1946 and became one of its first Ugandan commissioned officers. Amin rose through the ranks and was eventually made the
army's chief of staff under Uganda's first president, Milton Obote. In 1971 Amin overthrew Obote and seized power.
He became internationally famous in 1976 when he provided a safe haven for hostage-holding Palestinian hijackers, who were
then attacked and killed at Entebbe by Israeli forces. In 1978 Amin's forces invaded neighboring Tanzania, but Tanzanian
forces drove them back and invaded Uganda, forcing Amin to flee. Amin used brutal force against opponents during his reign,
and it is estimated that he is responsible for at least 100,000 deaths (some estimates run as high as 500,000). After fleeing
Uganda he settled in Saudi Arabia. He died there in 2003, apparently succumbing to a mixture of hypertension, kidney failure
and other ailments.
Between 1951 and 1960 Amin was Uganda's heavyweight boxing champ... Amin had near-celebrity
status in the '70s, partly because of his goofball antics -- jumping into swimming pools in full uniform, for example...
Most sources suggest Amin was born in 1925, though at his death Ugandan officials claimed that Amin was 80.
The Hues Corporation's 1974 "Rock The Boat",
a U.S. #1 single and million-seller, was one of the early disco songs to hit #1. Other chart-topping songs included "Walking
in Rhythm" by The Blackbyrds, "Rock Your Baby" by George McCrae and "Love's Theme" by Barry White's
Love Unlimited Orchestra. Also in 1974, Gloria Gaynor released the first side-long disco mix vinyl album, which included
a remake of The Jackson 5's "Never Can Say Goodbye" and two other songs, "Honey Bee" and "Reach
Out (I'll Be There)". Also significant during this early disco period was Miami's KC and the Sunshine Band. Formed
by Harry Wayne Casey ("KC") and Richard Finch, KC and the Sunshine Band had a string of disco-definitive top-five
hits between 1975 and 1977, including "Get Down Tonight", "That's the Way (I Like It)", "(Shake,
Shake, Shake) Shake Your Booty", "I'm Your Boogie Man" and "Keep It Comin' Love".
The Bee Gees used Barry Gibb's falsetto to garner hits such as "You Should Be Dancing", "Stayin'
Alive", "Night Fever" and "More Than A Woman". In 1975, hits such as Van McCoy's "The Hustle"
and Donna Summer's "Love to Love You Baby" and "Could It Be Magic" brought disco further into the
mainstream. Other notable early disco hits include The Jacksons’s "Dancing Machine" (1974), Barry White’s
"You're the First, the Last, My Everything" (1974), LaBelle’s "Lady Marmalade" (1975) and Silver
Convention’s "Fly Robin Fly" (1975). Chic's "Le Freak" (1978) became a classic and is heard
almost everywhere disco is mentioned; other hits by Chic include the often-sampled "Good Times" (1979) and "Everybody
Dance" (1978).
In a year otherwise
lacking in street cred, the ultimate "cool" sport of snowboarding was born and the car to drive was the Austin Allegro,
preferably in brown, with velour trim and square "quartic" steering wheel.
Daredevil motorcycle stunt rider
Evel Knievel was the man of the moment. Chopper even launched a Knievel push-bike, complete with fake exhaust pipe.
Making
good use of the things that they find, the Wombles emerged from their Wimbledon Common burrow for the first time to tidy Britain
(and eat Madame Cholets cakes).
Women were allowed onto the floor of the Stock Exchange in London for the first time
on the 1st of February.
Priests were called out to calm audiences as the most reviled horror movie of all time, The
Exorcist, opened in cinemas.
Never again would absent-minded smokers return home from the pub gutted, after lending
their brand new Zippo to "that bloke on the pool table". The Bic disposable lighter was born.
Not quite a
crisp, not quite an alien spaceship. Not even a drummer in a band. Golden Wonder introduced Ringos.
The developing
nations experienced economic growth that came in the wake of political independence. However, several African economies declined
and political states became dictatorial regimes. Many Middle Eastern democracies crumbled into chaotic regimes with pseudo-democratic
governments.
The 1970s ethos in much of the developing world was characterized by the constant need to re-define social
norms to newer socio-economic systems. As well, people were influenced by the rapid pace of change of the new social influences
and the constant aspiration for a more egalitarian society in cultures that were long colonized and have an even longer history
of hierarchical social structure.
The first facelifts were attempted in the 1970s. The 1970s saw
the rise of experimental classical music and minimalist music by composers such as Philip Glass, Steve Reich and Michael Nyman.
This was a break from the intellectual serial music of the tradition of Schoenberg which lasted from the early 1900s to 1960s.
Experimental classical music influenced both art rock and progressive rock as well as the punk rock and New Wave genres.
Hard rock also emerged among British bands Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath. In Europe, there was a
surge of popularity in the early decade for glam rock. The mid-seventies saw the rise of punk music from its protopunk/garage
band roots in the 1960s and early 1970s. Major acts include The Ramones, Blondie, the Sex Pistols, and The Clash.
The rise of disco
music, which first crept into dance clubs in the mid-seventies, was another major trend. Disco soon fell out of favor in the
early 1980s, however, due to a religious revival and the rise of conservatism. The first half of the 1970s saw many jazz musicians
from the Miles Davis school achieve cross-over success through jazz-rock fusion. In Germany, Manfred Eicher started the ECM
label, which quickly made a name for 'chamber jazz'. Towards the end of the decade, Jamaican reggae music, already
popular in the Caribbean and Africa since the early 1970s, became very popular in the U.S. and in Europe, mostly because of
reggae superstar and legend Bob Marley. The late '70s also saw the beginning of hip hop music with the song Rapper's
Delight by Sugarhill Gang. Country music remained very popular in the U.S. In 1977 it became more mainstream after Kenny Rogers
became a solo singer and scored many hits on both the country and pop charts.
Hollywood emerged
from its early 1970s slump with young film-makers taking greater risks and exploring more adult subject matter in movies such
as A Clockwork Orange and The Godfather. The nostalgic Love Story was a huge commercial and critical hit. The 1970s saw a
rebirth of the action film with movies like The French Connection. Airport was hugely successful and launched a series of
disaster-related films, such as Earthquake. Throughout the seventies, the horror film developed into a lucrative genre of
film; notable examples include The Exorcist, The Omen, Halloween, and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Blaxploitation also emerged
as a genre. Top-grossing Jaws(1975) ushered in the blockbuster era of film-making, though it was eclipsed two years later
the science-fiction epic Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977).
In the United
States, long-standing trends were declining. The Red Skelton Show and The Ed Sullivan Show, long-revered American institutions,
were canceled. The "family sitcom" saw its last breath at the start of the new decade with The Brady Bunch. Television
was transformed by what became termed as "social consciousness" programming such as All in the Family, which broke
down television barriers. The television western, which had been very popular in the 1960s, slowly died out during the 1970s,
with The High Chaparral, The Virginian, and Gunsmoke ending their runs. By the mid- to late 1970s, "jiggle television"--programs
centred around sexual gratification and bawdy humor and situations such as Charlie's Angels and Three's Company--became
popular. Soap operas expanded their audience beyond housewives with the rise of All My Children and As the World Turns. Game
shows such as The Hollywood Squares and Family Feud were also popular daytime television. Another influential genre was the
television newscast, which built on its initial widespread success in the 1960s. Finally, the variety show received its last
hurrah during this decade, with shows such as The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour and Donny & Marie.
During the Seventies,
support for the British royal family was thought to have dwindled, but the Silver Jubilee of Elizabeth II in 1977 assuaged
the family's fears of being irrelevant in a more modern Britain. Elaborate parades and street parties were thrown in the
Queen's honour, and the Queen met with millions of her subjects on a tour throughout the Commonwealth. In spite of such
widespread support, an emerging class of people voiced opposition to the monarchy, epitomized in the Sex Pistols' song
"God Save the Queen". About two thousand people died in political violence between the police, British army and
paramilitary groups during the seventies.
In 1970s European
cinema, the failure of the Prague Spring brought about nostalgic motion pictures such as István Szabó's
Szerelmesfilm (1970). German New Wave and Rainer Fassbinder's existential movies characterized film-making in Germany.
The movies of the Swedish director Ingmar Bergman reached a new level of expression in motion pictures like Cries and Whispers
(1973).
Asian cinema of the 1970s catered to the rising middle class fantasies and struggles. In the Bollywood cinema
of India, this was epitomised by the movies of Bollywood superhero Amitabh Bachchan. Another Asian touchstone beginning in
the early '70s was traditional Hong Kong martial arts film which sparked a greater interest in Chinese martial arts to
the West. Martial arts film reached the peak of its popularity largely in part due to its greatest icon, Bruce Lee.
Fiction in the early '70s brought a return to old-fashioned storytelling, especially with Erich Segal's Love
Story. The seventies also saw the decline of previously well-respected writers, such as Saul Bellow and Peter De Vries, who
both released poorly received novels at the start of the decade. Racism remained a key literary subject. John Updike emerged
as a major literary figure. Reflections of the 1960s experience also found roots in the literature of the decade through the
works of Joyce Carol Oates and Morris Wright. With the rising cost of hard-cover books and the increasing readership of "genre
fiction," the paperback became a popular medium. Criminal non-fiction also became a popular topic. Irreverence and satire,
typified in Kurt Vonnegut's Breakfast of Champions, were common literary elements. The horror genre also emerged, and
by the late seventies Stephen King had become one of the most popular genre novelists.
In nonfiction, several books related to Nixon and the Watergate scandal
topped the best-selling lists. 1977 brought many high-profile biographical works of literary figures, such as those of Virginia
Woolf, Agatha Christie, and J.R.R. Tolkien. Books discussing sex such as Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex but Were
Afraid to Ask were popular as authors took advantage of the lifted censorship laws on literature in the sixties. Exposés
such as All the President's Men were also popular. Self-help and diet books replaced the cookbooks and home fix-it manuals
that topped the sixties's charts.
The 1970 FIFA
World Cup, the ninth staging of the World Cup, was held in Mexico, from May 31 to June 21. Mexico was chosen as hosts by FIFA
in October 1964. The 1970 tournament was the first World Cup hosted in North America, and the first held outside South America
and Europe. In a match-up of teams that had won the World Cup twice, the final was won by Brazil, who beat Italy 4-1. This
means Brazil were the first three-time world champions and were allowed to keep the Jules Rimet Trophy permanently.
The Brazilian team, featuring the likes of Pelé (who was in his fourth and final World Cup), Carlos Alberto,
Clodoaldo, Gérson, Jairzinho, Rivelino, and Tostão, is usually regarded as the greatest attacking World Cup
team ever. This tournament saw the return of free-flowing, attacking play after the physical battles of 1962 and 1966, and
is still considered by many fans to be the finest World Cup in history.
The perfect word to describe 1970 clothes is psychedelic!
Colors and crazy motifs characterize the style of this era. First the hippies, and then the disco music were the main influences
on 1970 clothes and fashion.
At the end of the 60’s, fashion was based on the hippie and swinging style.
In the 70’s, some fashionable items of the previous decade remained. Bell-bottom pants from the hippie era and mini-skirts
from the swinging era were still on vogue. But this time, fashions were mixed, and a woman could choose to use a mini skirt
or a full length skirt whenever she wanted and she would look great. Full length skirts came into fashion when hippie women
started wearing them. These skirts were out of fashion as in the 60's mini-skirts were the new trend.
The fashion
of the 70’s is characterized by its mixture of colors and interesting motifs. The travel conditions of the 70’s
allowed people to travel around the world easily and designers could bring ideas as regards motifs and designs from other
ethnic groups. This is why we find so much variety and exoticism in 1970 clothes.
Pants went through many changes
during this decade. After the hippies, bell-bottom pants appeared, but they flared gradually during the 70’s. At first
they flared a bit, but then they got really wide until the end of the 70’s when they were narrow again. Today, wide
bell-bottom remain a symbol of 1970 clothes.
But 1970 clothes also demanded a change in hair style. With the new
decade, new hair style trends emerged. Short androgynous haircut for women was very fashionable during the 60’s. But
at the end of that decade the hippie movement produced some modifications in fashion and long hair was again seen on the streets.
During the 70's long hair style for women was very feminine and in vogue. Hair styles were wild and flat at the same time.
The disco fashion was some sort of movement during the 70’s that brought about a new and original style. The
1970 clothes during the disco era went through a series of changes. From shoes to hair, the disco style could be detected
at a glance. Bright colors, satin fabrics, high platform shoes and tight t shirts were some of the items that characterized
this 1970 clothes style. During this era, the aim was to look as cool as possible and to show off your body. If you were skinny
enough to fit into super tight pants and shirts, then you had to show it.
When we remember the disco fashion and
1970 clothes from this era we immediately associate it with Saturday nights and fun. The dance movement was some kind of explosion
of nine-fivers, who were tired of working so much during the week and were craving for some fun and relaxing. Disco clothes
were worn during the night and were not appropriate for day wear. However, this type of 1970 clothes had great influence on
everyday wear and even children wore pimp shirts.
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