Top News Stories from 1971
World Events
World Statistics
Population: 4.378 billion
population by decade Nobel Peace Prize: Willy Brandt (West Germany)
More World Statistics... - A military junta led by Major General Idi Amin siezes power in Uganda (Jan. 25).
- Mao Zedong invites the US ping-pong team to visit Beijing (Apr. 6).
- Nixon ends the US trade embargo against China. (Apr. 14).
- Erich Honecker assumes leadership of the East German Communist Party after Walter Ulbricht's resignation (May).
- India and the USSR sign a 20-year friendship pact (Aug. 9).
- President Mobutu renames the Democratic Republic of Congo, establishing Zaire (Oct. 27).
U.S. Events
U.S. Statistics
President: Richard M. Nixon
Vice President: Spiro T. Agnew
Population: 207,660,677
Life expectancy: 71.1 years
Violent Crime Rate (per 1,000): 41.6
Property Crime Rate (per 1,000) 37.7
More U.S. Statistics... - US Supreme Court rules unanimously that busing of students may be ordered to achieve racial desegregation (April 20).
- Anti-war militants attempt to disrupt government business in Washington (May 3)—police and military units arrest as many as 12,000; most are later released.
- Pentagon Papers published (June 13).
- Twenty-sixth Amendment to US Constitution lowers voting age to 18. (June 30).
Economics
US GDP (1998 dollars): $1,125.40 billion
Federal spending: $210.17 billion
Federal debt $408.2 billion
Median Household Income(current dollars):
9,028
billion Consumer Price Index: $40.5
Unemployment: 4.9%
Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.06 ($0.08 as of 5/16/71)
Sports
Super Bowl
Baltimore d. Dallas(16-13)
World Series
Pittsburgh d. Baltimore(4-3)
NBA Championship
Milwaukee d. Baltimore Bullets(4-0)
Stanley Cup
Montreal d. Chicago(4-3)
Wimbledon
Women:Evonne Goolagong d. M. Court
(6-4 6-1)Men:
John Newcombe d. S. Smith
(6-3 5-7 2-6 6-4 6-4)Kentucky Derby Champion
Canonero IINCAA Basketball Championship
UCLA d. VillanovaNCAA Football Champions
Nebraska (13-0-0)Entertainment
Entertainment Awards
Pulitzer Prizes Music: Synchronisms No. 6 for Piano and Electronic Sound, Mario Davidowsky
Drama: The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, Paul Zindel
Oscars awarded in 1971 Academy Award, Best Picture: Patton, Frank McCarthy, producer (Twentieth Century-Fox)
Nobel Prize for Literature: Pablo Neruda (Chile)
Record of the Year:
"Bridge Over Troubled Water," Simon and Garfunkel
Album of the Year: Bridge Over Troubled Water, Simon and Garfunkel (Columbia)
Song of the Year: "Bridge Over Troubled Water," Paul Simon, songwriter
Miss America: Phyllis Ann George (TX)
More Entertainment Awards... Events
- All in the Family debuts on CBS and introduces a trend in socially conscious programming.
- Jim Morrison dies in Paris at age 27. (July 3).
- The Allman Brothers' Duane Allman dies in a motorcycle accident at age 24. (Oct. 29).
- The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts opens in Washington, D.C. with the premiere of Leonard Bernstein's Mass.
Movies
- A Clockwork Orange, The French Connection, The Last Picture Show, Fiddler on the Roof, McCabe & Mrs. Miller
Books
- E.M. Forster, Maurice
- John Hawkes, Blood Oranges
- Frank O'Hara, The Collected Poems
- Bernard Malamud, The Tenants
- Cynthia Ozick, The Pagan Rabbi and Other Stories
- Wallace Stegner, Angle of Repose
Science
Nobel Prizes in Science
Chemistry: Gerhard Herzberg (Canada), for contributions to knowledge of electronic structure and geometry of molecules, particularly free radicals
Physics: Dennis Gabor (UK), for invention of holographic method of three-dimensional imagery
Physiology or Medicine: Earl W. Sutherland, Jr. (US), for research on how hormones work
Physiology or Medicine:
More Nobel Prizes in 1998... Julius Axelrod (US), Ulf S. von Euler (Sweden), and Sir Bernard Katz (UK), for studies of how nerve impulses are transmitted within the body
- Intel introduces the microprocessor. Background: Computers and Internet
- Cho Hao Li synthesizes the growth hormone somatotropin. Background: Health & Nutrition
- Mariner IX, orbitting Mars, takes revealing pictures of the planet's surface. Background: US Unstaffed Planetary and Lunar Programs
