1970


Events

   * January 1 - Unix epoch begins at 00:00:00 UTC.
   * January 12 - Biafra capitulates, ending the Nigerian civil war.
   * January 15 - After a 32-month fight for independence from Nigeria,
     Biafra surrenders.
   * January 15 - Muammar al-Qaddafi is proclaimed premier of Libya
   * January 16 - Buckminster Fuller receives the Gold Medal award from the
     American Institute of Architects.
   * February 11 - John Lennon pays £1,344 in fines for 96 people who had
     protested against the South African rugby team playing in Scotland.
   * February 11 - Japan becomes the fourth country to launch a satellite
     into orbit.
   * February 18 - The Chicago Eight are found not guilty of conspiring to
     incite riots at the 1968 United States Democratic Party national
     convention.
   * February 26 - National Public Radio incorporates as a non-profit
     corporation
   * March 1 - Rhodesia severs its last tie with the British crown and
     declares itself a racially segregated republic.
   * March 5 - A nuclear non-proliferation treaty goes into effect after
     ratification by 43 nations.
   * March 17 - My Lai massacre: The United States Army charges 14 officers
     with suppressing information related to the incident.
   * March 23 - Del Lord, pioneer Hollywood director
   * March 31 - Explorer I reentry (after 12 years in orbit)
   * April 1 - President Richard Nixon signs the Public Health Cigarette
     Smoking Act into law banning cigarette television advertisements in the
     United States starting on January 1, 1971.
   * April 11 - Apollo 13 ill-fated space mission launched
   * April 17 - Apollo 13 returns safely to earth
   * April 22 - First Earth Day celebrated
   * March 18 - Lon Nol ousts Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia
   * April 29 - U.S. invades Cambodia to hunt out Viet Cong
   * May 4 Four students at Kent State University in Ohio are killed by
     National Guardsmen at a demonstration protesting incursion into
     Cambodia.
   * May 17 - Thor Heyerdahl sets sail from Morocco on the papyrus boat Ra
     II to sail the Atlantic Ocean.
   * May 26 - The Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 becomes the first commercial
     transport to exceed Mach 2.
   * June 24 - The United States Senate repeals the Gulf of Tonkin
     resolution.
   * July 21 - - Aswan High Dam in Egypt completed.
   * August 17 - Venera program: Venera 7 is launched. It will later becomes
     the first spacecraft to successfully transmit data from another planet.
   * September 5 - Vietnam War: Operation Jefferson Glenn begins - The
     United States 101st Airborne Division and the South Vietnamese 1st
     Infantry Division initiate a new operation in Thua Thien Province
     (operation ends in October 1971).
   * September 11 - The Ford Pinto is introduced
   * September 13 - First running of the New York City Marathon
   * October - the Front de LibŽration du QuŽbec (FLQ) kidnap James Cross
     and murder Pierre Laporte, provoking Quebec's October Crisis
   * October 8 - Vietnam War: In Paris, a Communist delegation rejects US
     President Richard Nixon's October 7 peace proposal as "a maneuver to
     deceive world opinion."
   * October 9 - The Khmer Republic is proclaimed in Cambodia.
   * October 10 - Fiji becomes independent.
   * October 10 - October Crisis: In Montreal, Quebec, a national crisis
     hits Canada when Quebec Vice-Premier and Minister of Labour Pierre
     Laporte becomes the second statesman kidnapped by members of the FLQ
     terrorist group.
   * October 12 - Vietnam War: US President Richard Nixon announces that the
     United States will withdraw 40,000 more troops before Christmas.
   * October 15 - 35 construction workers are killed when a section of the
     new West Gate Bridge in Melbourne collapses into the river below.
   * October 17 - Anwar Sadat becomes president of Egypt
   * October 30 - In Vietnam, the worst monsoon to hit the area in six years
     causes large floods, kills 293, leaves 200,000 homeless and virtually
     halts the Vietnam War.

Births

   * January 13 - Keith Coogan, actor
   * January 31 - Minnie Driver, actress
   * March 18 - Queen Latifah, rapper, record producer, actress
   * March 27 - Mariah Carey, singer
   * March 28 - Vince Vaughn, actor, writer, producer
   * March 30 - Secretariat, 1973 Triple Crown winner, two-time Horse of the
     Year (+ 1989)
   * April 4 - Barry Pepper, actor
   * April 13 - Rick Schroeder, actor
   * April 29 - Andre Agassi, professional tennis star
   * April 29 - Uma Thurman, actress
   * May 12 - Mike Weir, Canadian professional golfer
   * May 16 - Gabriela Sabatini, tennis player
   * May 18 - Tina Fey, writer, comedienne, actress
   * May 22 - Naomi Campbell, model, actress
   * May 24 - Jeff Zgonina, football player
   * May 24 - Tommy Page, singer
   * May 27 - Joseph Fiennes, actor
   * June 26 - Chris O'Donell, actor
   * July 8 - Beck, rock and roll singer
   * July 24 - Jennifer Lopez, actress, singer
   * August 6 - M. Night Shyamalan, film director, writer, producer, actor
   * August 13 - Alan Shearer, England and Newcastle soccer player
   * August 18 - Malcolm-Jamal Warner, actor
   * August 23 - Jay Mohr, actor, comedian
   * August 25 - Claudia Schiffer, model
   * August 31 - Debbie Gibson, singer
   * September 9 - Macy Gray, singer
   * September 23 - Ani DiFranco, musician
   * September 28 - Isabelle Brasseur, figure skating champion
   * October 2 - Kelly Ripa, actress, television host
   * October 8 - Matt Damon, actor
   * October 9 - Annika Sšrenstam, Swedish golfer
   * October 15 - Eric Benet, singer
   * November 5 - Jen Besemer, surrealist poet and painter

Deaths

   * January 5 - Max Born, physicist and recipient of the Nobel Prize in
     physics 1954
   * January 5 - Jock Yablonski, President of the United Mine Workers, death
     discovered of he and family)
   * January 10 - Pavel Belyayev, cosmonaut
   * January 25 - Jane Bathori, opera singer
   * January 31 - Slim Harpo, blues singer
   * February 2 - Bertrand Russell, logician and philosopher
   * February 11 - Emil Abranyi, composer
   * February 25 - Mark Rothko, painter
   * March 11 - Erle Stanley Gardner, author
   * March 16 - Tammi Terrell, singer
   * March 23 - Del Lord, pioneer Hollywood director
   * March 30 - Heinrich BrŸning, German Reichskanzler 1930-1932
   * April 5 - Alfred Henry Sturtevant geneticist (+ 1891)
   * April 26 - Gypsy Rose Lee, actress
   * April 26 - John Knittel, dramatist
   * April 27 - Gypsy Rose Lee, burlesque entertainer
   * April 30 - Inger Stevens, actress
   * May 6 - George Rivas, ringleader of the Texas 7
   * May 9 - Walter Reuther, labor union leader
   * May 14 - Billie Burke, actress, The Wizard of Oz
   * May 12 - Nelly Sachs, writer and recipient of the Nobel Prize in
     Literature 1966
   * June 16 - Brian Piccolo, American football star
   * June 21 - Sukarno, Indonesian President
   * July 4 - Barnett Newman, painter
   * July 13 - Arthur Miller, writer
   * July 19 - Egon Eiermann, architect
   * July 22 - Fritz Kortner, director
   * July 22 - Grete Wiesenthal, dancer and choreographer
   * July 29 - John Barbirolli, conductor
   * August 1 - Frances Farmer, actress
   * September 1 - Francois Mauriac, author
   * September 3 - Vince Lombardi, American football coach
   * September 5 - Jochen Rindt, Austrian racing driver
   * September 11 - Ernst May, architect
   * September 18 - Jimi Hendrix, rock musician
   * September 25 - Erich Maria Remarque, author
   * September 28 - Gamal Abdal Nasser, first president of Egypt
   * September 28 - John Dos Passos, novelist
   * September 29 - Edward Everett Horton, actor
   * October 4 - Janis Joplin, blues and rock and roll singer
   * October 10 - Grethe Weiser, actress
   * October 17 - Pierre Laporte, statesman, murdered by FLQ terrorists
   * October 24 - Richard Hofstadter, historian
   * November 9 - Charles de Gaulle, French general, statesman
   * December 7 - Rube Goldberg, cartoonist

Nobel Prizes

   * Physics - Hannes Olof Gšsta AlfvŽn, Louis Eugne FŽlix NŽel
   * Chemistry - Luis F Leloir
   * Medicine - Sir Bernard Katz, Ulf von Euler, Julius Axelrod
   * Literature - Aleksandr Isaevich Solzhenitsyn
   * Peace - Norman E. Borlaug
   * Economics - Paul Samuelson