The final days of 1966 were a bur.There were visitors to the house,and we all enjoyed the season.There were all the new clothes to wear and new toys to occupy ourselves with.There were turkey sandwiches everyday,the New Years day rolled around, and there was a roast ham,and everyone was getting dressed up in their finest clothes and going pout somewhere to ring in the New Year.My sister and I were both too young to even know what that meant, so we stayed at home, went to bed early as usual,and when we awoke,it was 1967.We went to bed thinking how odd it was to say"good-night,see you next year." Then,in the morning,we took down the Christmas Tree,put away the strings of lights,that now looked not bright,but forlorn.We put the tree outside for the trash collectors to take, and the season was over.
Nineteen Sixty Seven was in some ways like the one one,or the ones that had come before it.There were still race riots, Americans and Soviets were still trying to outdo one another in space, and in testing the latest weaponry closer to home.It was surprising how few days went by without some news of the space program, and the more and more powerful bombs that were being tested, and such things occupied a much more prominent place in the minds of everyone, even children than they do today.
In 1967,the Boeing 737 made it's maiden flight.The first Super Bowl was played,and The Green Bay Packers defeated the Kansas City Chiefs 35-10. May 2nd was a day like none since,because on that day, the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Montreal Canadiens four games to two to win The Stanley Cup. The draft board refused to grant a draft exemption to Mohammad Ali,and later in the year he was drafted, then stripped of his title for refusing to serve.
On January 12th,Dr.James Bedford was the first ever person to be frozen, in the hopes that he would someday be resuscitated.To the best of my knowledge, he's still waiting patiently.1967 also saw the first heart transplant preformed in South Africa,though it's recipient only lived a short time.The late, great John F. Kennedy's body was moved from a temporary grave, to a permanent memorial, but nobody was entertaining thoughts of his resuscitation,because his body was likely not in the best of shape, missing a brain,as it was reputed to be.Two days before, on January 10th,Edward W. Brooke was sworn in to represent the state of Massachusetts in the Senate.He was the first African American to be elected to that office.January tenth also saw the inception of PBS.
In June,what is now known as the Six Day War began between Israel and Egypt,Jordan and Syria.On the twenty eighth of the month,Israel annexed East Jerusalem.A day before that saw the first ATM installed,in England.On the last day of the month,Robert Henry Lawrence Jr. was named the first African American astronaut.In December,he was killed in a training accident.
Racial events were making news, if not always progress in other ways in 1967 as well.Early in June, the United States Supreme Court voted unanimously to end laws against interracial marriage.Speaking of the Supreme Court,1967 was also the year that justice Thurogood Marshall was appointed and confirmed, another first for an African America.That,at least was progress,America beginning to move out of it's dark ages,called Jim Crow. In December,someone attempted to assassinated singer Bob Marley at a concert rehearsal.
Born in 1967 were runner Donovan Bailey,singer Kurt Cobain,and actors Nicole Kidman,Julia Roberts and Jimmy Kimmel.
Jack Ruby died in prison in 1967. Physicist Robert Oppenheimer, one of those responsible for building the atomic bomb,left the world such as it had become in part because of his work.Musician John Coltrane died of cancer,actress Vivien Leigh of tuberculosis, and revolutionary Che Guevara was executed in Bolivia.
In 1967,monthly rent was about one hundred twenty five dollars and the average cost of a new home was about fourteen thousand dollars, or roughly two full years salary for the average person.A gallon of gas was about thirty three cents.Yearly inflation was 2.7% in America, and on the first of November, silver hit a record in London.One dollar,ninety-five per ounce.
1967 saw the launch of Rolling Stone Magazine.Popular films that year included Dirty Dozen,In The Heat Of The Night and Guess Who's Coming To Dinner which seemed very apt in light of all the progress on other fronts.Popular television shows of that year were The Monkees,Star Trek(also especially appropriate),Peyton Place,I Dream Of Jeannie,Bewitched and Hogans Heroes(just to prove that there was still a race of people who we could still ridicule).
Almost four hundred words were cited for the first time in The Oxford English Dictionary.They included MOOG,referring to an electronic synthesizer invented the previous year,no-fault,referring to auto insurance that pays regardless of who was at fault,and microburst, which was originally a term applied to radio transmissions.The word "hoagie" was also first cited.It referred to a submarine sandwich,and the reference was originally a term local to the city of Philadelphia.The word bummer referred, to a bad experience, and the word interface was first used to describe what computers do. Tae Kwon Do was first used to describe a Korean form of martial arts.The words Ibuprofen and Jihadist also appeared for the first time.Scratch and sniff also made it's debut,and the word scumbag first appeared to refer to an undesirable or despicable person.That word seems almost prophetic, given that Nixon was about to run for president the following year,to say nothing of all the clowns to follow,in both high and low places. Scumbags were becoming fashionable as the years moved forward,from 1967,even up until the present day.
World leaders of the day were Lyndon Johnson in America,Leonid Brezhnev in Russia,Harold Wilson in Great Britain and Indira Gandhi in India.In Canada,Lester B.Pearson was Prime Minister,until he retired from politics in December, ushering in the first Trudeau era.But not before Canada celebrated with a huge birthday party.
Continued
Nineteen Sixty Seven was in some ways like the one one,or the ones that had come before it.There were still race riots, Americans and Soviets were still trying to outdo one another in space, and in testing the latest weaponry closer to home.It was surprising how few days went by without some news of the space program, and the more and more powerful bombs that were being tested, and such things occupied a much more prominent place in the minds of everyone, even children than they do today.
In 1967,the Boeing 737 made it's maiden flight.The first Super Bowl was played,and The Green Bay Packers defeated the Kansas City Chiefs 35-10. May 2nd was a day like none since,because on that day, the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Montreal Canadiens four games to two to win The Stanley Cup. The draft board refused to grant a draft exemption to Mohammad Ali,and later in the year he was drafted, then stripped of his title for refusing to serve.
On January 12th,Dr.James Bedford was the first ever person to be frozen, in the hopes that he would someday be resuscitated.To the best of my knowledge, he's still waiting patiently.1967 also saw the first heart transplant preformed in South Africa,though it's recipient only lived a short time.The late, great John F. Kennedy's body was moved from a temporary grave, to a permanent memorial, but nobody was entertaining thoughts of his resuscitation,because his body was likely not in the best of shape, missing a brain,as it was reputed to be.Two days before, on January 10th,Edward W. Brooke was sworn in to represent the state of Massachusetts in the Senate.He was the first African American to be elected to that office.January tenth also saw the inception of PBS.
In June,what is now known as the Six Day War began between Israel and Egypt,Jordan and Syria.On the twenty eighth of the month,Israel annexed East Jerusalem.A day before that saw the first ATM installed,in England.On the last day of the month,Robert Henry Lawrence Jr. was named the first African American astronaut.In December,he was killed in a training accident.
Racial events were making news, if not always progress in other ways in 1967 as well.Early in June, the United States Supreme Court voted unanimously to end laws against interracial marriage.Speaking of the Supreme Court,1967 was also the year that justice Thurogood Marshall was appointed and confirmed, another first for an African America.That,at least was progress,America beginning to move out of it's dark ages,called Jim Crow. In December,someone attempted to assassinated singer Bob Marley at a concert rehearsal.
Born in 1967 were runner Donovan Bailey,singer Kurt Cobain,and actors Nicole Kidman,Julia Roberts and Jimmy Kimmel.
Jack Ruby died in prison in 1967. Physicist Robert Oppenheimer, one of those responsible for building the atomic bomb,left the world such as it had become in part because of his work.Musician John Coltrane died of cancer,actress Vivien Leigh of tuberculosis, and revolutionary Che Guevara was executed in Bolivia.
In 1967,monthly rent was about one hundred twenty five dollars and the average cost of a new home was about fourteen thousand dollars, or roughly two full years salary for the average person.A gallon of gas was about thirty three cents.Yearly inflation was 2.7% in America, and on the first of November, silver hit a record in London.One dollar,ninety-five per ounce.
1967 saw the launch of Rolling Stone Magazine.Popular films that year included Dirty Dozen,In The Heat Of The Night and Guess Who's Coming To Dinner which seemed very apt in light of all the progress on other fronts.Popular television shows of that year were The Monkees,Star Trek(also especially appropriate),Peyton Place,I Dream Of Jeannie,Bewitched and Hogans Heroes(just to prove that there was still a race of people who we could still ridicule).
Almost four hundred words were cited for the first time in The Oxford English Dictionary.They included MOOG,referring to an electronic synthesizer invented the previous year,no-fault,referring to auto insurance that pays regardless of who was at fault,and microburst, which was originally a term applied to radio transmissions.The word "hoagie" was also first cited.It referred to a submarine sandwich,and the reference was originally a term local to the city of Philadelphia.The word bummer referred, to a bad experience, and the word interface was first used to describe what computers do. Tae Kwon Do was first used to describe a Korean form of martial arts.The words Ibuprofen and Jihadist also appeared for the first time.Scratch and sniff also made it's debut,and the word scumbag first appeared to refer to an undesirable or despicable person.That word seems almost prophetic, given that Nixon was about to run for president the following year,to say nothing of all the clowns to follow,in both high and low places. Scumbags were becoming fashionable as the years moved forward,from 1967,even up until the present day.
World leaders of the day were Lyndon Johnson in America,Leonid Brezhnev in Russia,Harold Wilson in Great Britain and Indira Gandhi in India.In Canada,Lester B.Pearson was Prime Minister,until he retired from politics in December, ushering in the first Trudeau era.But not before Canada celebrated with a huge birthday party.
Continued
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