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July 1978

Month of 1978 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

July 1978
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The following events occurred in July 1978:

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July 25, 1978: The first human being conceived by in vitro fertilization is born.
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July 7, 1978: The Solomon Islands are granted independence by Britain
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July 1, 1978 (Saturday)

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The new Northern Territory flag
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July 2, 1978 (Sunday)

  • Australia's government announced that it was purchasing the Cocos Islands from their owner, John Clunies-Ross, whose family had been granted private ownership of the 27 Indian Ocean atolls in 1886 by the British Empire's Queen Victoria. The Commonwealth of Australia had placed the Cocos under government authority in 1955. At the time of Australia's acquisition, the Cocos had 360 inhabitants, mostly Australians of Malay descent as well as the Clunies-Ross family.[5]
  • As the deadlock in Italy's presidential election continued in the electoral college, the founder of the Italian Socialist Party, Chamber of Deputies President Sandro Pertini was introduced as a compromise candidate.[6]
  • The People's Republic of China announced that it would not provide further economic aid to Vietnam, after having given 14 billion U.S. dollars to North Vietnam and over the previous 20 years, with decreasing amounts after the 1975 conquest of South Vietnam.[7]
  • Born:
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July 3, 1978 (Monday)

  • The Amazon Co-operation Treaty (ACT) was signed by the South American nations of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela to promote sustainable development of the basin of the Amazon River valley.[9]
  • The children's afternoon TV program Récré A2 premiered on the French TV network Antenne 2, and would run for almost 10 years. Intended to run only during summer vacation, the show was broadcast as an after school program from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. on most weekdays, with a two-hour program on Wednesday afternoons from 3:00 to 5:00. It would conclude on June 29, 1988, a few days short of its 10th anniversary."[10]
  • By a vote of 5 to 4, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to ban profane language from the radio and television broadcast from within the United States, holding that the right of free speech guaranteed in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution did not include the right to use "indecent language" in broadcasts, and defined "indecent" as "not conforming to generally-accepted standards of morality."[11]
  • Born: Mizuki Noguchi, Japanese long-distance runner and 2004 Olympics women's marathon gold medalist; in Shizuoka Prefecture
  • Died:

July 4, 1978 (Tuesday)

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July 5, 1978 (Wednesday)

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July 6, 1978 (Thursday)

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July 7, 1978 (Friday)

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July 8, 1978 (Saturday)

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July 9, 1978 (Sunday)

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July 10, 1978 (Monday)

  • Moktar Ould Daddah, who had been the President of Mauritania since the northwest African nation's independence in 1960, was overtrown in a coup d'etat by Colonel Mustafa Ould Salek.[44]
  • Voters in the South American nation of Guyana reportedly approved the proposal for a new constitution by an overwhelming majority, including new rules to outlaw future referendums on the constitution to make amendments. Prime Minister Forbes Burnham, whose People's National Congress Party had obtained control of 37 of the 53 seats in parliament, obtained a mandate to allow parliament to change the constitution by a two-thirds vote, and would push through changes canceling the upcoming election, changing Guyana to a presidential republic, and giving him broad powers as president. The government issued figures claiming that more than 70% of the registered voters turned out to vote, and that of those, more than 97% voted for the new constitution.[45][46]
  • Born: Ray Kay (stage name for Reinert K. Olsen), Norwegian photographer and video director, MTV Video Music Award winner; in Haugesund.
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July 11, 1978 (Tuesday)

July 12, 1978 (Wednesday)

July 13, 1978 (Thursday)

July 14, 1978 (Friday)

  • Henri Maïdou took office as the last Prime Minister of the Central African Empire, after being appointed by the Emperor Bokassa.[63] Upon the overthrow of Bokassa and the restoration of the Central African Republic a year later, Maïdou became Vice President in the regime of President David Dacko.
  • Soviet dissident Anatoly Shcharansky was sentenced to three years in prison, followed by 10 years in a labor camp, after insisting that the Soviet Union should abide by its commitments in the 1975 Helsinki Accords to improve human rights. Shcharansky was convicted of "anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda" and on a lesser degree of treason under Articles 70 and 64-a of the penal code for his activity in the Moscow Helsinki Group.[64]
  • At the age of 65, American long distance swimmer Walter Poenisch became the first person to swim from Cuba to the United States, arriving at the island of Little Duck Key in the U.S. state of Florida, 33 hours after having departed from the Cuban capital, Havana.[65]
  • Died: Maria Grinberg, 69, Soviet Russian pianist[66]

July 15, 1978 (Saturday)

July 16, 1978 (Sunday)

  • Pope Paul VI, leader of the Roman Catholic Church, became seriously ill at his summer residence at the Palace of Castel Gandolfo, the day after meeting with Italy's President Sandro Pertini. The 80-year-old Pontiff's condition worsened over the next three weeks and he would die on August 6.[72]
  • Died: Howard Estabrook (pen name for Howard Bolles), 94, American screenwriter, film director and stage actor, 1931 Academy Award winner for Best Adapted Screenplay for Cimarron[73]

July 17, 1978 (Monday)

July 18, 1978 (Tuesday)

July 19, 1978 (Wednesday)

  • Bolivia's National Election Court issued an order annulling the results of the July 9 presidential election, because of evidence of "irregularities all along the process" during voting before a transition to civilian government, and directed that a new election be held within the next 180 days. General Juan Pereda, who had been declared the winner of the election, had asked to discard the results and to hold another vote "to avoid sorrow and tears for the nation."[75]
  • Born: Fahad Yasin Haji Dahir, Somali government official, Director of Somalia's HSNQ intelligence agency 2019 to 2021, National Security Advisor tp the President from 2021 to 2022; in Mandera, Kenya[76]
  • 'Died: Malcolm Galloway, 91, founder of the New Zealand Red Cross

July 20, 1978 (Thursday)

July 21, 1978 (Friday)

  • General Juan Pereda, who was declared the winner of the July 9 election in Bolivia despite evidence of massive fraud, was installed as the new President of Bolivia. The Bolivian Army staged a coup d'etat that toppled President Hugo Banzer, who had come to power in a coup in 1971.[79]
  • The divorce of Princess Margaret, sister of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, from Antony Armstrong-Jones, became final 18 years after they had married, and marked the first royal divorce since 1901.
  • Terrorists in Madrid killed two officers of the Spanish Army, killing Brigadier General Juan Sanchez Ramos and his aide, Lieutenant Colonel Jose Antonio Perez, as the two men sat in a car in front of General Sanchez's home. The Basque separatist organization ETA (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna) claimed responsibility for the killings, saying that the Spanish Army was "the axis of fascist repression" in the Basque provinces, although two other terror groups claimed that they had made the killings.[80][81]
  • Born: Kyoko Iwasaki, Japanese swimmer and 1992 Olympic gold medalist, at age 14 in the 200m breaststroke; in Numazu, Shizuoka Prefecture

July 22, 1978 (Saturday)

July 23, 1978 (Sunday)

July 24, 1978 (Monday)

July 25, 1978 (Tuesday)

July 26, 1978 (Wednesday)

July 27, 1978 (Thursday)

July 28, 1978 (Friday)

July 29, 1978 (Saturday)

  • Carlos Menem, formerly the Governor of Argentina's La Rioja Province was released from the Magdalena prison more than two years after he had been arrested on charges of corruption following the 1976 overthrow of President Isabel Perón.[98] In 1989, after the restoration of democracy, Menem would be elected as the President of Argentina and serve for more than 10 years, until 1999. Menem would later be arrested on charges of embezzlement in 2001 and 2013, being placed under house arrest each time.[99]

July 30, 1978 (Sunday)

  • On the Japanese island of Okinawa, residents returned to driving on the left side of the road, the law in the rest of Japan, more than 43 years after of having been switched to right-hand traffic when the island had been under American control.
  • Convicted murderers Randy Greenawalt and Gary Gene Tison, both serving life sentences at Florence State Prison in the U.S. state of Arizona, was able to escape with the aid of Tison's three sons, Donald, Ricky and Raymond, who were not searched when they arrived for a visit.[100] Once inside, two of the Tison brothers pulled out a shotgun from a cardboard box they had carried inside. The next day, the escapees murdered a family of four, including two children. After 12 days on the lam, Greenawalt and two of the Tison brothers were captured;[101] Gary Tison fled the scene but was later found dead. Greenawalt would be executed at Florence State Prison in 1997, while the surviving Tyson brothers would have their death sentences commuted to life imprisonment.
  • Farnum Fish, 81, American airplane pilot known as "The Boy Aviator" for having been a licensed pilot at age 15.[102]

July 31, 1978 (Monday)

  • In Burma (now Myanmar), Operation Nagamin, the forced expulsion of the minority Rohingya people in Arakan State (now Rakhine state) to Bangladesh ended as Burma and Bangladesh signed a repatriation agreement moderated by the United Nations and the International Red Cross. The Burmese military operation had started on February 6 and as many as 250,000 people were forced to flee. After the signing of the pact, more than 180,000 returned from Bangladesh to Burma.[103]
  • Royal assent was given in the United Kingdom to the Scotland Act 1978, providing for residents of Scotland to vote on limited self-government.[104] The Act also required that at least 40 percent of Scotland's registered voters had to approve of the change in law, rather than a majority of voters who participated in the referendum. The voting, held on March 1, 1979, showed that 51.6% voted yes, but less than 2.4 million of Scotland's 3.7 million registered voters participated, so the approval was by less than one-third of the electorate.
  • North Korean agents kidnapped Kaoru Hasuike and his girlfriend, Yukiko Okudo, from a beach in the town of Kashiwazaki in Japan's Niigata Prefecture, and kept them for the next 24 years.[105] The two, who married and had children, were allowed to visit Japan in 2002 while North Korea held their daughter and son as hostages. Hasuike and Okudo elected to remain in Japan, and the two children would be allowed to leave two years later. Hasuike would later publish a memoir, Abduction and My Decision, recounting his experience.[106]
  • Born:
  • Died: Enoch Light, 70, American dance band leader [109]

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