1979

Events:

   * January 1 - 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.
   * January 16 - The Shah of Iran flees Iran with his family and relocate
     to Egypt after a year of turmoil.
   * 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 is welcomed back into Tehran,
     Iran after nearly 15 years of exile.
   * February 11 - Ayatollah Ruhollah 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 17 - The People's Republic of China invades northern Vietnam.
   * February 22 - Independence of Saint Lucia from the United Kingdom.
   * March 14 - In China, a Trident aircraft 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 28 - Nuclear power plant accident at Three Mile Island, Pa.,
     releases radiation
   * April 1 - Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini proclaims Iran to be an Islamic
     Republic.
   * April 6 - President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of Pakistan is executed.
   * May 4 - Conservatives win the British election; Margaret Thatcher
     becomes the new prime minister.
   * 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 on two people on the ground.
   * June 4 - Joe Clark becomes Canada's sixteenth, and youngest, prime
     minister.
   * June 18 - Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev sign the SALT II agreement
     in Vienna.
   * July 16 - Iraqi President Hasan al-Bakr resigns and 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.
   * August 27 - Lord Mountbatten killed by the I.R.A..
   * 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 dollars to avoid bankruptcy.
   * October 14 - The first gay rights march in the United States takes
     place in Washington, DC, involving many tens of thousands of people.
   * November 4 - Iranian militants seize the U.S. embassy in Teheran and
     take hostages.
   * November 16 - Bucharest Metro Line 1 is opened, in Bucharest, Romania
     (from Timpuri Noi to Semanatoarea stations, 8.63 km)
   * November 28 - Air New Zealand DC-10, on a sightseeing trip, crashes
     into Mount Erebus, Antarctica, killing all 257 people on board.
   * December 24 - Soviet Union invades Afghanistan
   * December 27 - The Soviet Union seizes control of Afghanistan and Babrak
     Karmal replaces overthrown and executed President Hafizullah Amin.

   * The Susan B. Anthony one dollar coin is introduced in the US
   * VisiCalc becomes the first spreadsheet program.

Art, Culture & Fashion

   * 1979 in film
        o Apocalypse Now
        o Caligula
        o Kramer vs. Kramer
        o Mad Max
        o March - Production begins on the Star Wars sequel, The Empire
          Strikes Back.
        o November - Production begins on Raiders of the Lost Ark.
   * 1979 in television
        o February 11 - 43 million viewers watch "Elvis!" on ABC.
        o Over 300 million households worldwide now own television sets.
   * 1979 in mediaart
        o The first Ars Electronica Festival takes place in Linz/Austria

Births:

   * January 16 - Aaliyah, singer (+ 2001)
   * January 24 - Tatyana Ali, actress
   * February 9 - Mena Suvari, actress
   * February 11 - Brandy Norwood, singer.
   * February 21 - Jennifer Love Hewitt, actress, singer
   * March 30 - Norah Jones, musician
   * April 4 - Heath Ledger, actor
   * April 10 - Rachel Corrie, American activist, member of the
     International Solidarity Movement.
   * June 10 - Blasete, physicist.

Deaths:

   * January 3 - Conrad Hilton, hotelier
   * January 5 - Charles Mingus, American jazz musician
   * January 26 - Nelson Rockefeller, Governor of New York, Vice President
     of the United States
   * February 2 - Sid Vicious of Sex Pistols
   * February 7 - Josef Mengele, Nazi war criminal
   * February 12 - Jean Renoir, Film Director
   * February 23 - W.A.C. Bennett, British Columbia politician
   * February 28 - "The famous Mr. Ed", the talking horse, dies.
   * March 28 - Emmett Kelly, clown
   * April 4 - Ali Bhutto, President and Prime Minister of Pakistan
   * April 10 - Nino Rota, composer
   * May 29 - Mary Pickford, actress, studio founder
   * July 3 - Louis Durey, composer, member of Les Six
   * July 16 - Alfred Deller, singer, early modern countertenor
   * August 27 - Earl Mountbatten of Burma, 79, British World War II hero,
     and three others are killed by a blast on a fishing boat off the Irish
     coast; two I.R.A. members are accused on August 30.
   * September 8 - Jean Seberg, actress
   * October 6 - Elizabeth Bishop, poet
   * October 10 - Christopher Evans, British psychologist and computer
     scientist
   * December 7 - Prince Chahryar Shafik, nephew of the Shah of Iran,
     murdered in Paris, France.
   * December 23 - Peggy Guggenheim, art collector
   * December 27 - Hafizullah Amin, president of Afghanistan

Nobel Prizes:

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

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