1974

1974 is a common year starting on Tuesday (click on link for calendar).

Years: 1971 1972 1973 - 1974(MCMLXXIV) - 1975 1976 1977
Decades: 1940s 1950s 1960s - 1970s - 1980s 1990s 2000s
Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century Template:C20YearInTopic

Events

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January-February

January 5 - Dungeons & Dragons officially released.
February 1 - The Joelma Fire kills 188 in São Paulo.
February 3 - Prisoners riot in the Bathurst Jail Riots, destroying much of the jail.
February 4 - Patricia Hearst, the 19 year old granddaughter of publisher William Randolph Hearst, is kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army.
February 8 - After 84 days in space, the crew of the temporary American space station, Skylab, return to Earth.
February 12 - US District Court Judge George Boldt rules that Native American tribes in Washington State are entitled to half of the legal salmon and steelhead catches, based on treaties signed by the tribes and the US government.
February 13 - Nobel Prize winning writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn is expelled from the Soviet Union (he returns May 27 1994)
February 20 - Following a visit to his home from a woman wearing a strange pendant, Phillip K Dick begins to receive a series of visions which he refers to as 2-3-74, shorthand for February/March of 1974.
February 23 - The Symbionese Liberation Army demand $4 million more to release kidnap victim Patty Hearst.
February 27 - People magazine is published for the first time.
February 28 - United Kingdom general election results in an almost dead-heat.
February 28 - Ethiopian prime minister Tsehafi Aklilu Habte-Wold, who has held the position since 1961, is dismissed by Emperor Haile Selassie and replaced with Endelkachew Makonnen.

March

March 1 - Watergate scandal: Seven are indicted for their role in the Watergate break-in and charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice.
March 1 - Pierre Messmer finishes his first term as Prime Minister of France.
March 3 - A Turkish Airlines DC-10 travelling from Paris to London crashes in a wood near Paris, killing all 346 aboard.
March 8 - Charles de Gaulle Airport opens in Paris, France.
March 18 - Oil embargo crisis: Most OPEC nations end a five-month oil embargo against the United States, Europe and Japan.
March 10 - Ten miners die in a methane gas explosion at Golborne Colliery near Wigan, Lancashire.
March 20 - Ian Balls fails in his attempt to kidnap Her Royal Highness Princess Anne and her husband Captain Mark Phillips in The Mall, outside Buckingham Palace, London.
March 29 - Mariner 10 approaches Mercury.

April-May

April 1 - the Local Government Act 1972 comes into effect in England and Wales, creating six new metropolitan counties and comprehensively redrawing the administrative map
April 3 - The Super Outbreak, the largest series of tornadoes in history, hits 13 U.S. states and one Canadian province. By the time the last of 148 tornadoes hit early the following morning, 315 died and over 5,000 were injured.
April 10 - In Israel, Golda Meir resigns as Prime Minister
April 25 - Coup in Portugal restores democracy (see Carnation Revolution)
April 28 - Last Americans evacuated from Saigon
May 4 - All female Japanese team summits Manaslu and become the first women to climb an 8,000 metre peak.
May 9 - The United States House of Representatives Judiciary Committee opens formal and public impeachment hearings against President Richard M. Nixon
May 17 - Los Angeles, California police raid Symbionese Liberation Army headquarters, killing six members, including Camilla Hall
May 17 - Thirty-three people die in the Dublin and Monaghan Bombings in Ireland. Members of the UDR and UVF, allegedly assisted by British intelligence, are behind the blast.
May 18 - Nuclear test: Under project Smiling Buddha, India successfully detonates its first nuclear weapon becoming the sixth nation to do so.
May 18 - Completition of Warsaw radio mast. The Warsaw radio mast was the tallest construction ever built. It collapsed on August 8, 1991
May 19 - In the second round of the presidential elections in France, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing wins from François Mitterrand, but by a close margin.

June

June 1 - Flixborough disaster: An explosion at a chemical plant in Flixborough, UK kills 28 people
June 6 - A new Instrument of Government is promulgated making Sweden a parliamentary monarchy
June 15 - The Red Lion Square disorders
June 17 - A bomb explodes at the Houses of Parliament in London damaging Westminster Hall. The bomb had been planted by the Irish Republican Army
June 24 - The UPC label is used for the first time to ring up purchases at a supermarket.
June 30 - Assassination of Alberta King, mother of the late Martin Luther King, during a church service

July

July 7 - West Germany defeats Netherlands to win the Football World Cup 1974.
July 14 - Christine Chubbuck, US television presenter for WXLT-TV, draws a revolver and shoots herself in the head during a live broadcast. She dies in a hospital 14 hours later.
July 15 - Military coup overthrows President Makarios in Cyprus
July 17- A bomb planted by the Irish Republican Army explodes in the White Tower at the Tower of London, killing one person and injuring 41. Another bomb explodes outside a government building in South London.
July 20 - Turkish occupation of Cyprus: Forces from Turkey invade Cyprus after Greek Cypriots' attempt at enosis.
July 22 - Ethiopian Prime Minister Endelkachew Makonnen is replaced with Mikael Imru.
July 23 - Greek military government collapses
July 24 - Watergate Scandal: The United States Supreme Court unanimously rules that President Richard Nixon did not have the authority to withhold subpoenaed White House tapes and they order him to surrender the tapes to the Watergate special prosecutor
July 27-30 - Watergate Scandal: The House of Representatives Judiciary Committee adopts three articles of impeachment charging President Richard M. Nixon with obstruction of justice, failure to uphold laws, and refusal to produce material subpoenaed by the committee.

August-October

August 3 - Former Scottish Works team Ferranti Thistle joins the Profesional Scottish Leagues and changes its name to Meadowbank Thistle Football Club.
August 4 - Bomb explodes in Italicus Expressen train between Italy and West Germany. Italian neo-fascist terrorists take responsibility
August 8 - Watergate scandal: US President Richard Nixon announces his resignation (effective August 9)
August 9 - Richard Nixon becomes the first President of the United States to resign from office, an action taken to avoid being removed by impeachment in response to his role in the Watergate scandal. His Vice President, Gerald Ford, takes the oath of office and becomes the 38th president
September 8 - Watergate Scandal: US President Gerald Ford pardons former President Richard Nixon for any crimes Nixon may have committed while in office.
September 13 - Japanese Red Army members seize the French Embassy in The Hague, Netherlands. They secure the release of member Yatuka Fumiya, $300.000 and a flight to Aden
September 23 - Ceefax is started by the BBC - one of the first public service information systems
October 5 - The Guildford Pub Bombings at The Horse and Groom and The Seven Stars kill 5 people, lead to the wrongful conviction and imprisonment of the Guildford Four the next year

November

November 7 - Lord Lucan disappears
November 7 - An IRA bomb explodes at the Kings Arms, Woolwich
November 8 - In Salt Lake City, Utah, Carol DaRonch narrowly escapes abduction by serial killer Ted Bundy
November 10 - Members of the Movement 2 June try to kidnap Günter von Drenkmann, the president of West Germany's Superior Court of Justice, at his home but he is fatally shot during the attempt
November 16 - Arecibo radio telescope sends an interstellar radio message towards M 13 great globular cluster
November 17 - Irish President Childers dies suddenly of a heart attack in the Republic of Ireland in the middle of a public speech
November 20 - The United States Department of Justice files its final anti-trust suit against AT&T. This suit later leads to the break up of AT&T and the Bell System.
November 21 - In Birmingham, England, two pubs are bombed, killing 21 people (the Birmingham Six were later sentenced to life in prison for this)
November 21 - George W. Bush is discharged from the US Air Force Reserve
November 22 - The United Nations General Assembly grants the Palestine Liberation Organization observer status.
November 27 - The Prevention of Terrorism Act is passed in the United Kingdom

December

December 1 - A Boeing 727 carrying TWA Flight 514 crashes 25 miles (40 km) northwest of Dulles International Airport during bad weather, killing all 92 people on-board
December 19 - Cearbhall Ó Dálaigh becomes the fifth President of Ireland, in a state inauguration in Dublin Castle
December 24 - Darwin, Australia almost completely destroyed by Cyclone Tracy

Unknown date

The Milgram experiment first described by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram in his 1974 book Obedience to Authority; An Experimental View.
Baltimore police strike
Volkswagen's Golf automobile first enters production. VW will go on to sell 22 million Golfs, and the model is still very popular today. The car is credited with popularizing the transverse front engine, front wheel drive layout most often used today.

Year in topic

1974 in film
- May - George Lucas creates the first draft of what would eventually become Star Wars.
- The Godfather, Part II
- Chinatown
- The Conversation
- The Towering Inferno
1974 in literature
- Carrie by Stephen King
1974 in music
- Band on the Run by Paul McCartney and Wings
- Seasons in the Sun by Terry Jacks
- I Honestly Love You by Olivia Newton-John
- ABBA wins the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest on April 6 with their song "Waterloo." The group will go on to become the most commercially successful pop group of the decade.
1974 in politics
1974 in sports
1974 in television
- Good Times premieres on CBS
- Happy Days premieres on ABC
- Little House on the Prairie, starring Michael Landon, premieres on NBC.
- September 10 - The controversial TV movie Born Innocent, starring Linda Blair, was first screened on the NBC network in the United States. The film, which involved a fourteen-year-old being sent to what the television preview deemed a women's prison (when in reality it was a reform school), drew heavy criticism due to an all-female rape scene, the first ever seen on American television. The scene was deleted in subsequent re-airings after a group of girls assaulted an eight-year-old with a pop bottle, influenced by the scene in the film.