• The United States Supreme Court officially banned state restrictions on abortions in its landmark Roe v. Wade case.
• U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War officially ended.
• The Watergate hearings dragged on, with the resignations of John Erlichmann, John Dean, and Spiro Agnew, the firing of Archibald Cox, and the appointment of Gerald Ford as vice president.
• Native Americans revolted in Wounded Knee, South Dakota.
• Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho split the Nobel Peace Prize.
• The Yom Kippur War broke out betweeen Israel, Syria and Egypt. Israel won, but Golda Meir's goverment fell.
• An oil embargo was placed on the United States by several Arab nations in retaliation for American support of Israel.
• Denmark, Ireland and the United Kingdom joined the EC.
• West Germany and East Germany were admitted to the United Nations.
• Afghanistan's monarchy was overthrown.
• Laos reached a cease fire with its native communist insigators (which didn't last very long).
• Ferdinand Marcos passed a new constitution in the Philippines that would give him an unprecedented amount of power.
• The Bahamas gained their independence from Britain.

• The crisis in the Middle East inspired an oil exploration boom in the North Sea.
• The first CRT capable of displaying bitmap images was introduced.
• The first computer mouse was built.
• Intel developed the 8080 microprocessor.
• Semiconductor researchers Leona Ezaki, Ivar Giaever, and Brian Josephson split the Nobel Prize for Physics.
• Skylab, the first U.S. space station, was launched.
• Pioneer 11 began making its way to Saturn, while Mariner 10 was sent to observe Venus and Mercury up close.
• Soyuz 12 and 13 marked the first manned Soviet space flights since the Soyuz 11 disaster of 1971.
• Britain and France wrapped up testing of their joint SST program, the Concorde, while the Tupolev Tu-144 was flying in Russia.
• Stanley Cohen and Herbert Boyer became the first scientists to transplant a gene from one bacterium to another, marking the birth of modern genetic engineering.

• The Sting won Best Picture at the Academy Awards: Jack Lemmon snagged Best Actor for Save the Tiger.
• Roberta Flack picked up multiple Grammys for "Killing Me Softly With His Song," and Stevie Wonder also made a good showing with his Innervisions album.
• Mary Tyler Moore and M*A*S*H were the biggest shows on TV in the United States.
• Patrick White won the Nobel Prize in Literature.
• Disney released Robin Hood.

• Secretariat won the Triple Crown.
• George Foreman won his first world heavyweight title, which he would soon have to defend against Muhammad Ali.
• Bayern Munich won the European Cup (and would win two more in a row), and AC Milan won the Cup Winners' Cup.
• The Miami Dolphins were Super Bowl champions. Notre Dame and Alabama were NCAA football champions, and UCLA's basketball dynasty won one of its last championships.
• Jack Nicklaus won the PGA Championship, and Tommy Aaron won the Masters.
• John Newcombe was the U.S. and Australian tennis champion.
• The Oakland Athletics triumphed over the New York Yankees in the World Series.

• Norwegian crown prince Haakon Magnus and crown princess Mette Marit
• Rappers Nas, Mos Def, Sean Paul, and Daz Dillinger
• Boxer Oscar de la Hoya
• TV host Carson Daly
• Footballer Ole-Gunnar Solskjaer
• Magician David Blaine
• Models Heidi Klum and Angelica Bridges
• Pr0n star Asia Carrera
• Actor Omar Epps
• Actresses Neve Campbell, Kate Beckinsale, Tina Yothers, and Tori Spelling

• U.S. president Lyndon B. Johnson
• Chilean president Salvador Allende
• East German leader Walter Ulbricht
• Swedish king Gustav VI Adolf
• Artist Pablo Picasso
• Actors John Ford and Hayakawa Sessue
• Martial artist Bruce Lee
• Flying ace Eddie Rickenbacker
• Poets W. H. Auden and Conrad Aiken
• Authors Pearl Buck and J.R.R. Tolkien
• Grateful Dead member Ron "Pigpen" McKernan

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