The Year of 1979

January

• January 1
  • United Nations Secretary General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the International Year of the Child. Many musicians donate to the Music for UNICEF Concert fund including ABBA, who wrote the song Chiquitita, to commemorate the event.
  • The United States and the People's Republic of China establish full diplomatic relations.
• January 4 – The State of Ohio agrees to pay $675,000 to families of the dead and injured in the Kent State shootings.
• January 7 – Vietnam and Vietnam-backed Cambodian insurgents announce the fall of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and the collapse of the Pol Pot regime. Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge retreat west to an area along the Thai border.
• January 8 – The French tanker Betelgeuse explodes at the Gulf Oil terminal at Bantry, Ireland; 50 are killed.
• January 9 – The Music for UNICEF Concert is held at the United Nations General Assembly to raise money for UNICEF and promote the Year of the Child. It is broadcast the following day in the United States and around the world. Hosted by The Bee Gees, other performers include Donna Summer,ABBA, Rod Stewart and Earth, Wind & Fire. A soundtrack album is later released.
• January 16 – Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi of Iran flees Iran with his family, relocating to Egypt after a year of turmoil.
• January 19 – Former U.S. Attorney General John N. Mitchell is released on parole after 19 months at a federal prison in Alabama.
• January 29 – Brenda Ann Spencer opens fire at a school in San Diego, California, killing 2 faculty members and wounding 8 students. Her justification for the action, "I don't like Mondays," inspired the Boomtown Rats to make a song of the same name.

February

• February 1
  • Convicted bank robber Patty Hearst is released from prison after her sentence is commuted by U.S. President Jimmy Carter.
  • Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Tehran, Iran after nearly 15 years of exile.
• February 3 – Khomeini creates the Council of the Islamic Revolution.
• February 7
  • Supporters of Khomeini take over the Iranian law enforcement, courts and government administration; the final session of the Iranian National Consultative Assembly is held.
  • Pluto moves inside Neptune's orbit for the first time since either was known to science.
• February 10 – February 11 – The Iranian army mutinies and joins the Islamic Revolution.
• February 11 – Khomeini seizes power in Iran, overthrowing Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi.
• February 12 – Prime Minister Hissène Habré starts the Battle of N'Djamena in an attempt to overthrow Chad's President Félix Malloum.
• February 13 – The intense February 13, 1979 Windstorm strikes western Washington and sinks a 1/2-mile-long section of the Hood Canal Bridge.
• 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.
  • Following her 1972 sex reassignment surgery, musician Wendy Carlos legally changes her name from Walter. She later reveals this information in an interview in the May 1979 issue of Playboy Magazine.
• February 15 – A suspected gas explosion in a Warsaw bank kills 49.
• February 17 – The People's Republic of China invades northern Vietnam, launching the Sino-Vietnamese War.
• February 18 – The Sahara Desert experiences snow for 30 minutes.
• February 22 – Saint Lucia becomes independent of the United Kingdom.
• February 24 – Ethiopia recognizes the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR).
• February 26 – A total solar eclipse arcs over northern Canada, and a partial solar eclipse is visible over almost all of North America and Central America. ^[1]
• February 27 – The annual Mardi Gras celebration in New Orleans, Louisiana is canceled due to a strike called by the New Orleans Police Department.

[edit]March

• March 1 – Scotland votes narrowly for home rule, which is not implemented, and Wales votes against it.
• March 4 – The U.S. Voyager I spaceprobe photos reveal Jupiter's rings.
• March 5 – Voyager I makes its closest approach to Jupiter at 172,000 miles.
• March 7 – The largest Magnetar (Soft gamma repeater) event is recorded.
• March 8 – Philips demonstrates Compact Disc publicly for the first time.
• March 13 – Maurice Bishop leads a successful coup in Grenada.
• March 14 – In China, a Hawker Siddeley Trident crashes into a factory near Beijing, killing at least 200.
• March 17 – The Penmanshiel Tunnel in the U.K. collapses, killing 2 workers.
• March 18 – Ten miners die in a methane gas explosion at Golborne Colliery near Wigan, Lancashire.^[2]
• March 25 – The first fully functional space shuttle orbiter, Columbia, is delivered to the John F. Kennedy Space Center, to be prepared for its first launch.
• March 26 – In a ceremony at the White House, President Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel sign a peace treaty.
• March 28
  • In Britain, Jim Callaghan's minority Labour government loses a motion of confidence by 1 vote, forcing a general election which is to be held on 3 May.^[3]
  • America's most serious nuclear power plant accident, at Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania.
• March 29 – Sultan Yahya Petra of Kelantan, the 6th Yang di-Pertuan Agong (Head of State) of Malaysia, dies in office. He is replaced by Sultan Ahmad Shah of Pahang.
• March 30 – Airey Neave, World War II veteran and Conservative Northern Ireland spokesman, is killed by an Irish National Liberation Army bomb in the British House of Commons car park.
• March 31
  • The last British soldier (belonging to the Royal Navy) leaves the Maltese Islands, after 179 years of presence. Malta declares its Freedom Day (Jum il-Helsien).
  • Gali Atari and Milk and Honey win the Eurovision Song Contest 1979 for Israel, with the song Hallelujah.

[edit]April

• April 1
  • Iran's government becomes an Islamic Republic by a 98% vote, overthrowing the Shah officially.
  • The Pinwheel Network changes its name to Nickelodeon and begins airing on various Warner Cable systems beginning in Buffalo, New York, expanding its audience reach.
• April 1 – April 18 – Police lock Andreas Mihavecz in a holding cell in Bregenz, Austria, and forget about, leaving him there without food or drink.
• April 2 – Sverdlovsk Anthrax leak: A Soviet biowarfare laboratory at Sverdlovsk accidentally releases airborne anthrax spores, killing 66 plus an unknown amount of livestock.
• April 10
  • A tornado hits Wichita Falls, Texas, killing 42 people (the most notable of 26 tornadoes that day).
  • Cambodia recognizes the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR).
• April 11 – Tanzanian troops take Kampala, the capital of Uganda; Idi Amin flees.
• April 13 – The La Soufière volcano erupts in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
• April 15 – 1979 Montenegro Earthquake: A major earthquake (7.0 on the Richter scale) strikes Montenegro (then part of Yugoslavia) and parts of Albania, causing extensive damage to coastal areas and taking 136 lives; the old town of Budva is devastated.
• April 17 – Schoolchildren in the Central African Empire are arrested (and around 100 killed) for protesting against compulsory school uniforms. An African judicial commission later determines that EmperorJean-Bédel Bokassa "almost certainly" took part in the massacre.
• April 20 – President Jimmy Carter is attacked by a swamp rabbit while fishing in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, USA.
• April 22 – The Albert Einstein Memorial is unveiled at The National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC.
• April 23 – Fighting in London between the Anti-Nazi League and the Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group results in the death of protestor Blair Peach.

To read more at: Wikipedia