January
5 |
Dr.
Benjamin Spock; William Sloan Coffin the chaplain of Yale University;
novelist Mitchell Goodman; Michael Ferber, a graduate student
at Harvard; and Marcus Raskin a peace activist are indicted
on charges of conspiracy to encourage violations of the draft
laws by a grand jury in Boston. The charges are the result of
actions taken at a protest rally the previous October at the
Lincoln Memorial. The four will be convicted and Raskin acquitted
on June 14th. |
January
10 |
The
10,000th US airplane is lost over Vietnam. |
January
15 |
An
earthquake occurs in Sicily - 231 dead, 262 injured. |
January
17 |
President
Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908-1973) (an
LBJ Library photo by Kevin Smith taken this day) delivers
the State of the Union Address.
|
January
22 |
First
telecast of LaughIn
staring Dan Rowan, Dick Martin, Gary Owens, Ruth Buzzi, Goldie
Hawn, Arte Johnson, Jo Anne Worley, Henry Gibson, and others. |
January
23 |
North
Korean patrol boats capture the USS
Pueblo, a US Navy intelligence gathering vessel and its
83 man crew on charges of violating the communist country's
twelve-mile territorial limit. This crisis would dog the US
foreign policy team for 11 months, with the crew of the Pueblo
finally gaining freedom on December 22. |
January
25 |
The
Israeli Submarine
Dakar sinks in the Mediterranean Sea - 69 dead. |
January
31 |
At
half-past midnight on Wednesday morning the North Vietnamese
launch the Tet
offensive at Nha Trang. Nearly 70,000 North Vietnamese troops
will take part in this broad action, taking the battle from
the jungles to the cities. The offensive will carry on for weeks
and is seen as a major turning point for the American attitude
toward the war. At 2:45 that morning the US embassy in Saigon
is invaded and held until 9:15AM. |
February
1 |
During
police actions following the first day of the Tet offensive
General Nguyen Ngoc Loan,
a south Vietnamese security official is captured on film executing
a Viet Cong prisoner by American photographer Eddie Adams. The
Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph becomes yet another rallying
point for anti-war protestors. Despite later claims that the
prisoner had been accused of murdering a Saigon police officer
and his family, the image seems to call into question everything
claimed and assumed about the Amrican allies, the South Vietnamese.
|
February
2 |
Richard
Nixon, a republican from California, enters the New Hampshire
primary and declares his presidential
candidacy. |
February
4 |
Martin
Luther King Jr. delivers a sermon at his Ebenezer Baptist
Church in Atlanta which will come to be seen as prophetic. His
speech contains what amounts to his own eulogy. After his death,
he says, "I'd like somebody to mention that day that Martin
Luther King Jr. tried to give his life serving others. I'd like
for somebody to say that day that Martin Luther King Jr. tried
to love somebody... that I tried to love and serve humanity,.
Yes, if you want to, say that I was a drum major for peace...
for righteousness." |
February
7 |
International
reporters arrive at the embattled city of Ben Tre in South Vietnam.
Peter Arnett, then of the Associated Press, writes a dispatch
quoting an unnamed US major as saying, "It became necessary
to destroy the town to save it." The quote runs nationwide
the next day in Arnett's report. |
February
8 |
American
civil rights movement: A civil rights protest staged at a white-only
bowling
alley in Orangeburg, South Carolina is broken-up by highway
patrolmen leading to the deaths of three college students.Also
on this daty, the Boeing 747 made its maiden flight. |
February
18 |
The
US State Department announces the highest US casualty toll of
the Vietnam War. The previous week saw 543 Americans killed
in action, and 2547 wounded. |
February
27 |
Walter
Cronkite reports on his recent trip to Vietnam to view the aftermath
of the Tet Offensive in his television special Who, What, When,
Where, Why? The report is highly critical of US officials and
directly contradicts official statements on the progress of
the war. After listing Tet and several other current military
operations as "draw[s]" and chastising American leaders
for their optimism, Cronkite advises negotiation "...not
as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their
pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could."
|
February
28 |
Ex-singer
Frankie Lymon
is found dead from heroin overdose. |
March
7 |
Vietnam
War: The First
Battle of Saigon begins. |
March
12 |
The
New Hampshire primary election brings shocking results. The
Eugene McCarthy campaign, benefitting from the work of 2,000
full-time student volunteers and up to 5,000 on the weekends
immediately preceding the vote comes within 230 votes of defeating
the sitting president Lyndon Johnson. These students, participants
in what McCarthy refers to as his "children's crusade"
have cut their hair, modified their wardrobes, and become "clean
for Gene" to contact the conservative voters in the state.
|
March
14 |
Nerve
gas leaks from US Army Dugway Proving Ground near Skull Valley,
Utah. |
March
16 |
Senator
Robert Kennedy, former Attorney General and brother of former
president John F. Kennedy (1961-63) ends months of debate by
announcing that he will enter the 1968 Presidential race. |
March
16
(same day) |
Although
it will not become public knowledge for more than a year, US
ground troops from Charlie Company rampage through the hamlet
of My Lai killing more than 500 Vietnamese civilians from infants
to the elderly. The massacre continues for three hours until
three American fliers intervene, positioning their helicopter
between the troops and the fleeing vietnamese and eventually
carrying a handful of wounded to safety. View the BBC
Special Report on the incident. |
March
17 |
A
demonstration in London's Grosvenor Square against US involvement
in the Vietnam War leads to violence - 91 police injured, 200
demonstrators arrested. |
March
22 |
In
Czechoslovakia Antonin Novotny resigns the Czech presidency
setting off alarm bells in Moscow. The next day leaders of five
Warsaw Pact countries meet in Dresden, East Germany to discuss
the crisis. |
March
27 |
Russian
space pioneer Yuri Gagarin killed in a crash during a training
flight. |
March
28 |
Martin
Luther King Jr. leads a march in Memphis which turns violent.
After King himself had been led from the scene one 16 year old
black boy is killed, 60 people are injured, and over 150 arrested.
|
March
31 |
President
Lyndon Johnson delivers his Address
to the Nation Announcing Steps To Limit the War in Vietnam
and Reporting His Decision Not To Seek Reelection. The speech
announces the first in a series of limitations on US bombing,
promising to halt these activities above the 20th parallel.
|
April
2 |
Bombs
placed by Andreas
Baader and Gudrun
Ensslin explode at midnight in two department stores in
Frankfurt-am-Main - 3 dead. Culprits are later arrested and
sentenced for arson. |
April
4 |
Martin
Luther King Jr. spends the day at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis
working and meeting with local leaders on plans for his Poor
People's March on Washington to take place late in the month.
At 6pm, as he greets the car and friends in the courtyard, King
is shot with one round from a 30.06 rifle. He will be declared
dead just an hour later at St. Joseph's hospital. After an international
man-hunt James Earl Ray will be arrested on June 27 in England,
and convicted of the murder. Ray died in prison in 1998.
Robert Kennedy, hearing of the murder just before he is to give
a speech in Indianapolis, IN, delivers a powerful extemporaneous
eulogy
in which he pleads with the audience "to tame the savageness
of man and make gentle the life of this world."
The King assassination sparks rioting in Baltimore, Boston,
Chicago, Detroit, Kansas City, Newark, Washington, D.C., and
many others. Across the country 46 deaths will be blamed on
the riots. |
April
11 |
United
States Secretary of Defense Clark Clifford calls 24,500 military
reserves to action for 2 year commitments, and announces a new
troop ceiling of 549,500 American soldiers in Vietnam. The total
number of Americans "in country" will peak at some
541,000 in August this year, and decline to 334,000 by 1970.
Also on this day, London Bridge is sold to Robert McCullough
for £1 million. It is later re-erected in Arizona. |
April
20 |
English
politician Enoch Powell makes controversial Rivers of Blood
Speech. |
April
23 |
A
rally and occupation of the Low administrative office building
at Columbia University, planned to protest the university's
participation in the Institute for Defense Analysis is scuttled
by conservative students and university security officers. The
demonstrators march to the site of a proposed new gymnasium
at Morningside Heights to stage a protest in support of neighbors
who use the site for recreation. The action eventually results
in the occupation of five buildings - Hamilton, Low, Fairweather
and Mathematics halls, and the Architecture building. It will
culminate seven days later when police storm the buildings and
violently remove the students and their supporters at the Columbia
administration's request. |
May
3 |
The
US and North Vietnamese delegations agree to begin peace talks
in Paris later this month. The formal talks will begin on May
10. |
May
6 |
In
France, "Bloody Monday" marks one of the most violent
days of the Parisian student revolt. Five thousand students
march through the Latin Quarter with support from the student
union and the instructors' union. Reports of the ensuing riot
conflict, either the police charge unprevoked, or demonstrators
harass them with thrown stones. The fighting is intense with
rioters setting up barricades and the police attacking with
gas grenades. Over-night the battle will subside, but only after
engaging the sympathies of large numbers of French unionists.
|
May
11 |
Ralph
Abernathy, Martin Luther King Jr.'s designated successor, and
the Southern Christian Leadership Corps are granted a permit
for an encampment on the Mall in Washington, DC. Eventually,
despite nearly a solid month of rain, over 2,500 people will
eventually occupy Resurrection City. On June 24th the site is
raided by police, 124 occupants arrested, and the encampment
demolished. |
May
13 |
The
actions taken by the students and instructors at the Sorbonne
inspires sympathetic strikes throughout France. As many as nine
million workers are on strike by May 22. President de Gaulle
takes action to shore up governmental power, making strident
radio addresses and authorizing large movements of military
troops within the country. These shows of force eventually dissipate
the French revolutionary furor. |
June
3 |
Andy
Warhol is shot in his New York City loft by Valerie Solanis,
a struggling actress, and writer. |
June
4/5 |
On
the night of the California Primary Robert Kennedy addresses
a large crowd of supporters at the Ambassador Hotel in San Francisco.
He has won victories in California and South Dakota and is confident
that his campaign will go on to unite the many factions stressing
the country. As he leaves the stage, at 12:13AM on the morning
of the fifth Kennedy is shot by Sirhan Sirhan, a 24 year old
Jordanian living in Los Angeles. The motive for the shooting
is apparently anger at several pro-Isreali speeches Kennedy
had made during the campaign. The forty-two year old Kennedy
dies in the early morning of June sixth. |
June
6 |
On
a Thursday evening at 8:00 pm, the Centralia High School Class
of 1968 graduates. |
June
8 |
Robert
Kennedy's funeral is held at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New
York. Senator Edward Kennedy, the youngest brother of John and
Robert delivers the eulogy. After the service, the body and
700 guests depart on a special train for the burial at Arlington
National Cemetery in Virginia. On this same day, James Earl
Ray is arrested for the murder of Doctor Martin Luther King
Jr. |
June
23 |
Soccer
stampede in Buenos Aires - 74 dead, 150 injured. |
June
27 |
As
the "Prague Spring"
continues in Czechoslovakia Ludvik Vaculik releases his manifesto
"Two Thousand Words". This essay, criticizing Communist
rule in Czechoslovakia and concluding with an overt threat to
"foreign forces" trying to control the government
of the country was seen as a direct challenge to the Soviet
Administration who extended ongoing military exercises in the
country, and began planning for their invasion later in the
summer. |
June
28 |
A
bill adding a 10 percent surcharge to income taxes and reducing
government spending is signed by President Johnson. The president
effectively admits it has been impossible to provide both "guns
and butter." |
July
7 |
Abbie
Hoffman's "The Yippies are Going to Chicago" is published
in The Realist. The yippie movement, formed by Hoffman, Jerry
Rubin and Paul Krassner, all committed activists and demonstrators,
is characterized by public displays of disorder ranging from
disrupting the trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange
to the destruction of the Clocks at Grand Central Terminal,
the main commuter station for workers in New York City. The
Yippie's will be in the center of action six weeks later at
the Chicago Democratic National Convention, hosting a "Festival
of Life" in contrast to what they term the convention's
"Festival of Death." |
July
24 |
At
the Newport (Rhode Island) Folk Festival singer Arlo Guthrie
performs his 20 minute ballad "Alice's
Restaurant" to rave reviews. |
August
8 |
At
their Party convention in Miami Beach the Republicans nominate
Richard
Milhouse Nixon to be their presidential candidate. The next
day Nixon will appoint Spiro Agnew of Maryland as his running
mate. Nixon has been challenged in his campaign by Nelson Rockefeller
of New York, and Ronald Reagan of California. |
August
20 |
The
Soviet Union invades Czechoslovakia with over 200,000 warsaw
pact troops, putting an end to the "Prague Spring,"
and beginning a period of enforced and oppressive "normalization." |
August
26 |
Mayor
Richard Daley opens the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
While the convention moves haltingly toward nominating Hubert
Humphrey for president, the city's police attempt to enforce
an 11 o'clock curfew. On that Monday night demonstrations are
widespread, but generally peaceful. The next two days, however,
bring increasing tension and violence to the situation.
|
August
28 |
By
most accounts, on Wednesday evening Chicago police take action
against crowds of demonstrators without provocation. The police
beat some marchers unconscious and send at least 100 to emergency
rooms while arresting 175.
Mayor Daley tried the next day to explain the police action
at a press conference. He famously explained: "The policeman
isn't there to create disorder, the policeman is there to preserve
disorder."
Twenty-eight years later, when the Democrats next held a convention
in Chicago, some police officers still on the force wore t-shirts
proclaiming, "We kicked their father's butt in '68 and
now it's your turn." |
September
1 |
Democratic
nominee Hubert Humphrey kicks off his presidential campaign
at New York City's Labor Day parade. |
September
7 |
Women's
Liberation groups, joined by members of New York NOW, target
the Miss America Beauty Contest
in Atlantic City. The protest includes theatrical demonstrations
including ritual disposal of traditional female roles into the
"freedom ashcan." While nothing is actually set on
fire, one organizer's comment - quoted in the New York Times
the next day - that the protesters "wouldn't do anything
dangerous, just a symbolic bra-burning," lives on in the
derogatory term "bra-burning feminist." |
September
29 |
This
date marks the thirtieth anniversary of Neville Chamberlain's
Munich agreement ceding Czechoslovakia's Sudatenland to Hitler.
This action widely seen as a major contributing factor to the
devastation of World War II. The domino theory which underlay
so much of American action in Vietnam can be seen as a direct
response to the failure of international response to the German
dictator. |
October
2 |
Police
and military troops in Mexico City react violently to a student
- led protest in Tlatelolco Square. Hundreds of the demonstrators
are killed or injured. |
October
3 |
George
Wallace, who has been running an independent campaign for the
presidency which has met significant support in the South and
the Midwest, names retired Air Force Chief of Staff Curtis E.
LeMay to be his running mate. At the press conference, the general
is asked about his position on the use of nuclear weapons, and
responds: "I think most military men think it's just another
weapon in the arsenal... I think there are many times when it
would be most efficient to use nuclear weapons. ... I don't
believe the world would end if we exploded a nuclear weapon."
|
October
11 |
Apollo
7 is launched from Florida for an eleven day journey which
will orbit the Earth 163 times. |
October
12 |
The
Summer Olympic Games open in Mexico City. The games have been
boycotted by 32 African nations in protest of South Africa's
participation. On the 18th Tommie Smith and John Carlos, US
athletes and medalists in the 200-meter dash will further disrupt
the games by performing the black power salute during the "Star-Spangled
Banner" at thier medal ceremony. |
October
20 |
Jacqueline
Kennedy is married to Aristotle Onassis, a Greek shipping magnate
on the private island of Skorpios. |
October
31 |
President
Johnson announces a total halt to US bombing in North Vietnam.
|
November
5 |
Election
Day. The results of the popular vote are 31,770,000 for Nixon,
43.4 percent of the total; 31,270,000 or 42.7 percent for Humphrey;
9,906,000 or 13.5 percent for wallace; and 0.4 percent for other
candidates. |
November
14 |
National
Turn in Your Draft Card Day is observed with rallies and protests
on college campuses throughout the country. |
November
26 |
After
stalling for months, the South Vietnamese government agrees
to join in the Paris peace talks.
December |
| December
11 |
The
unemployment rate, at 3.3 percent, is the lowest it has been
in fifteen years. |
| December
12 |
Robert
and Ethel Kennedy's daughter, Rory, their eleventh child is
born. |
| December
21 |
The
launch of Apollo
8 begins the first US mission to orbit the Moon. |
| |
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