There was an American League team in Washington, D.C., and it wasn't the Nationals, it was the Senators. There was also an American League team in Washington State, in Seattle, as there is now, but it wasn't the Mariners. It was the Pilots, who would, before the next season dawned, fill a 4-year void (save for a few "home games" in 1968 and '69 by the Chicago White Sox) and become the Milwaukee Brewers. The Houston Astros were in the National League. There were still minor-league teams in Dallas, Denver, Phoenix, Miami and the Tampa Bay area.
There were black players and Hispanic players in Major League Baseball, but no Asian players, and no designated hitter. Only the Astrodome in Houston had a roof, and it was not retractable. There was no regular-season Interleague Play.
The Pilots/Brewers, the Kansas City Royals, the Montreal Expos, and the San Diego Padres had all just debuted, and, between them, lost 411 games that season. The Baltimore Orioles won 109 games, a match for the most games won between 1954 and 1998... and still lost the World Series.
Every major league ballpark had lights except Wrigley Field in Chicago. But only one, the Astrodome, had artificial turf. That would soon change, as, the following season, multipurpose stadiums would open in Cincinnati and Pittsburgh with the plastic stuff, and in Philadelphia a year after that, while St. Louis, San Francisco and, strangely, Comiskey Park in Chicago would all put it down for a few years, before tearing it back up and replacing it with real grass.
But, for the moment, there were still 11 of the 24 teams playing in ballparks built before World War II, and 7 of them built in 1912 or earlier. Indeed, there were still 3 ballparks standing -- Comiskey, Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia (formerly Shibe Park) and Forbes Field in Pittsburgh -- that had hosted not just Cy Young Award winners, but Cy Young himself.
Of the 24 ballparks used by MLB teams that year, only 9 still stand, and only 5 are still in use by the teams then using them: Fenway, Wrigley, Dodger Stadium and Angel Stadium in the Los Angeles area, and the Oakland Coliseum. Still standing but no longer being used by an MLB team: Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in Washington (scheduled for demolition in 2021), San Diego Stadium (now SDCCU Stadium) and the Astrodome (dormant, its future uncertain).
The only NFL team still in the same stadium they were in for the 1969 season are the Green Bay Packers (Lambeau Field). The Los Angeles Rams and Oakland Raiders left the ones they used for 1969, and returned, but both are about to leave again, the Rams for a dome in suburban Inglewood, the Raiders for Las Vegas.
From the NBA and the NHL combined, only one arena remains from the 1969-70 season that was being played: Madison Square Garden in New York, then billed as "the New Madison Square Garden Center," but now older than the "Old Garden" that it replaced.
From the NBA and the NHL combined, only one arena remains from the 1969-70 season that was being played: Madison Square Garden in New York, then billed as "the New Madison Square Garden Center," but now older than the "Old Garden" that it replaced.
Major League Baseball celebrated the 100th Anniversary of professional baseball, with an all-time team that proclaimed Babe Ruth "Baseball's Greatest Player Ever" and Joe DiMaggio "Baseball's Greatest Living Player." Also on their list of greatest living players, but like Joe D no longer living today, were George Sisler, Charlie Gehringer, Joe Cronin, Pie Traynor, Ted Williams, Bill Dickey, Lefty Grove and Bob Feller. The only one still alive from that team is Willie Mays, still active at that time.
The National Football League celebrated its 50th season (the next year would be its 50th
Anniversary) with an all-time team, with members like Johnny Unitas, Sammy Baugh, Marion Motley, Don Hutson, Forrest Gregg, Mel Hein, Gino Marchetti, Leo Nomellini, Ray Nitschke, Dick "Night Train" Lane and Emlen Tunnell. All of these men were then all still alive. Unitas, Gregg and Nitschke were still active. All of them are now dead.
The NFL, in the process of being merged with the AFL, and had a combined total of 26 teams. There was a team in Baltimore, but it wasn't the Ravens. There was one in St. Louis, but it wasn't the Rams. There was one in Houston, but it wasn't the Texans.
Anniversary) with an all-time team, with members like Johnny Unitas, Sammy Baugh, Marion Motley, Don Hutson, Forrest Gregg, Mel Hein, Gino Marchetti, Leo Nomellini, Ray Nitschke, Dick "Night Train" Lane and Emlen Tunnell. All of these men were then all still alive. Unitas, Gregg and Nitschke were still active. All of them are now dead.
The Boston Patriots had yet to move out to the suburbs and became "the New England Patriots." The Patriots, 49ers, Raiders, Dallas Cowboys, Miami Dolphins and Pittsburgh Steelers had yet to win any World Championships. The Seattle Seahawks and Tampa Bay Buccaneers did not exist, nor did the Baltimore Ravens under that name. Between them, those teams have now won 29 Super Bowls.
Some of the NFL's founding fathers were not only still alive, but still involved: George Halas with the Chicago Bears, Art Rooney with the Steelers, and Dan Reeves with the Rams – no relation to the Cowboys running back of the same name, later to be head coach of the Broncos, Giants and Atlanta Falcons.
The defending World Champions in the 4 major sports were the Mets, the Jets, the Boston Celtics and the Montreal Canadiens. Yes, the Mets and the Jets were both World Champions, and the Knicks were about to be. Stop laughing. The Jets had actually won a title before the Knicks, who were now -- if you didn't count the American Basketball Association's New York Nets, out on Long Island -- the only New York team without a World Championship. But that would soon change.
What were the defining baseball players of my childhood doing at this time? Reggie Jackson had just finished his 2nd full season, in which he hit 47 home runs. Thurman Munson and Carlton Fisk had recently made their big-league debuts.
Tom Seaver and Nolan Ryan had helped the Mets to their Miracle – but, at this point, if you had bet then that neither one would ever win another World Championship, people would have laughed at you. (Of course, at that point, they also would have laughed if you had then bet that Ryan would win more games in the majors than Seaver.) Steve Carlton had recently struck out 19 Mets in a game, setting a new National League record -- and losing, because Ron Swoboda hit 2 home runs.
Pete Rose won his 2nd straight NL batting title, and his Cincinnati Reds teammate Johnny Bench had a pretty good season, but they hadn't yet won their 1st Pennant, Cincinnati's 1st since 1961. That would come the next season. Willie Stargell had just become the 1st player to hit a home run completely out of Dodger Stadium. Rod Carew had just won his 1st American League batting title. Carl Yastrzemski hit 40 home runs and drove in 111 runs, but his Red Sox had already changed significantly from their "Impossible Dream" Pennant team of 2 years earlier.
Mike Schmidt was still playing at Ohio University (not to be confused with The… Ohio State University, whose football team had just blown a 2nd straight National Championship by getting upset by arch-rival Michigan), and had yet to face a professional pitch. George Brett was still at El Segundo High School in Los Angeles County.
The head coaches of the major league teams then playing in the New York Tri-State Area were Ralph Houk of the Yankees, Gil Hodges of the Mets, Alex Webster of the Giants, Weeb Ewbank of the Jets, Red Holzman of the Knicks, York Larese of the Nets, and Emile Francis of the Rangers. Only Francis is still alive. The Islanders wouldn't begin play for another 3 years, the Devils for 13, the Red Bulls for 26, the Liberty for 27, NYCFC for 45.
Of the current coaches of the Tri-State Area teams: Barry Trotz of the Islanders was 7 years old. So was Domenec Torrent of New York City FC, who was just relieved of his duties, but his successor has not yet been named. Mike Miller of the Knicks was 5, Pat Shurmur of the Giants was 4, David Quinn of the Rangers was 3, and Kenny Atkinson of the Nets was 2. Aaron Boone of the Yankees, Carlos Beltran of the Mets, Adam Gase of the Jets, Katie Smith of the Liberty, Alain Nasreddine of the Devils and Chris Armas of the Red Bulls weren't born yet.
The Olympic Games have since been held in America 4 times, Canada 3 times; Japan, Russia and Korea twice; and once each in Germany, Austria, Bosnia, France, Spain, Norway, Australia, Greece, Italy, China, Britain and Brazil. The World Cup has since been held twice each in Mexico and Germany, and once each in America, Argentina, Spain, Italy, France, Japan, Korea, South Africa, Brazil and Russia.
The University of Texas had just beaten the University of Arkansas to win yet another college football "Game of the Century," and would beat Notre Dame in the Cotton Bowl to win the National Championship. It was the 1st time Notre Dame had accepted a bowl bid since their "Four Horsemen" went to the 1925 Rose Bowl. The University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) was about to win its 4th straight National Championship in college basketball, their 6th overall, and this time without a dominant center.
UCLA's recently-graduated dominating center, Lew Alcindor, was winning the NBA Rookie of the Year with the Milwaukee Bucks, who got him because they finished tied with the Phoenix Suns with the worst record in the NBA the season before (each club's 1st season), and the tie was broken when… the Bucks won a coin toss. Unfair? Perhaps: The Bucks did get a title out of it, in 1971, but haven't won one since. The Suns have never won one, although, like the Bucks, they've usually been good. Soon after that title, Alcindor changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
There were then 25 Amendments to the Constitution of the United States. There was, as yet, no Environmental Protection Agency, Title IX or legalized abortion. The Stonewall Riot had happened less than 6 months earlier.
Richard Nixon was President of the United States. Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson were still alive. So was the widow of Dwight D. Eisenhower, who had died earlier in the year. Gerald Ford was the Minority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives. Jimmy Carter was a former State Senator in Georgia, about to run his 2nd, much more successful, campaign for Governor. Ronald Reagan was in his 1st term as Governor of California.
Keep smiling, Tricky Dick. We know how the story ends.
George Herbert Walker Bush was a Congressman from Texas, and his son George had entered the Texas Air National Guard. Apparently, it was okay for him and his father to support the Vietnam War even if he didn't have to actually fight in it. Bill Clinton did not support the war, and managed to avoid service through means that, if not entirely ethical, were, at least, legal. He was then a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University. Hillary Rodham had just entered Yale Law School. Barack Obama was in grade school.
Donald Trump was at the University of Pennsylvania, having gotten 5 deferments, including one for bone spurs in his heel, not that anyone believed that. Joe Biden, who got a deferment due to asthma, had just gotten elected to the New Castle County Council in Delaware. Nancy Pelosi was working for San Francisco-based Congressman Philip Burton, whose seat she would win in 1986. Her brother, Thomas D'Alesandro Jr., like their father before them, was then Mayor of Baltimore.
Trump actually had decent hair then.
He was still an indecent person.
The Governor of New York was Nelson Rockefeller, having made 3 unsuccessful runs for President. The Mayor of New York City was John Lindsay, who had just been denied renomination by the City's Republican Party because of his poor handling of snow removal during the blizzard earlier in the year. But he ran as a 3rd-party nominee and won a 2nd term anyway.
The Governor of New Jersey was Richard J. Hughes, about to wrap up his 2nd term. Former Governor Robert B. Meyner had tried to get the office back, but lost to South Jersey Congressman William T. Cahill, who became the State's 1st Republican Governor in 16 years (8 of Meyner, 8 of Hughes).
There were still living people who were veterans of the Indian Wars, the Mahdist War, the Northwest Rebellion; competitors at the 1st modern Olympics in 1896, and in every World Series except those of 1905, 1906 and 1907.
The United Nations' International Labor Organization had just be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. The Pope was Paul VI. The current Pope, Benedict XVI, then Father Joseph Ratzinger, was teaching in his native Germany, at the University of Regensburg. There have since been 8 Presidents of the United States, 8 Prime Ministers of Britain and 4 Popes.
Canada's Prime Minister was Pierre Trudeau. He was young (51), dashing and charismatic. It was as if John F. Kennedy was singing lead for the Beatles – in French. Canada, as I said, now had its 1st Major League Baseball team, the Montreal Expos. And a group called The Guess Who had just become Canada's biggest rock band ever (to that point). For the first time ever, Canada was hip. Especially if you were an American worrying about being drafted.
Queen Elizabeth, 43, looking a bit like my grandmother did at that time.
Prince Charles, 19, looking a bit like I did at the same age.
In the season that ended earlier in the year, the League was won by Leeds United, and the FA Cup was won by Manchester City, the defending League Champions, beating Leicester City 1-0 on a goal by Neil Young – no, not that Neil Young.
AC Milan, led by perhaps Italy's greatest player ever, Gianni Rivera, won their 2nd European Cup by beating Ajax Amsterdam, led by 21-year-old wunderkind Johan Cruijff. Ajax and their "Total Football" would be back, big-time. The current season's European Cup would be won by the other major Dutch team of the time, Rotterdam's Feyenoord.
Major novels of the year included The Godfather by Mario Puzo, Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton, The French Lieutenant’s Woman by John Fowles, Portnoy’s Complaint by my fellow native of Essex Count, New Jersey, Philip Roth, Rich Man, Poor Man by Irwin Shaw, and The Seven Minutes by Irving Wallace (about a novel, of the same title, that was "the most banned book in history," containing a woman's thoughts during 7 minutes of sex).
There was also Naked Came the Stranger by Penelope Ashe. This was a name used for a composite of 24 authors (supposedly, 19 men and 5 women), conspiring to see if a novel could be really, really bad, but still sell big if it had a lot of sex scenes in it. This was a truly late-Sixties kind of experiment – and it worked.
Major non-fiction books included the career-launching memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou and the career-launching historical work Mary, Queen of Scots by Antonia Fraser.
J.R.R. Tolkein was still alive. Tom Clancy, rejected by the U.S. Army due to poor eyesight, had gone to work for an insurance company. Anne Rice was a graduate student at the University of California, having witnessed the People's Park demonstration earlier in the year. Stephen King was at the University of Maine. George R.R. Martin was at Northwestern University. John Grisham was in high school in the Mississippi suburbs of Memphis. J.K. Rowling was 4 years old, and living in Winterbourne, Gloucestershire, in the West Country of England..
No one had yet heard of John Rambo, Spenser: For Hire, George Smiley, The Punisher, Rocky Balboa, T.S. Garp, Arthur Dent, Jason Bourne, Hannibal Lecter, Celie Harris, Kinsey Millhone, Jack Ryan, Forrest Gump, John McClane, Alex Cross, Bridget Jones, Robert Langdon, Bella Swan, Lisbeth Salander or Katniss Everdeen.
In 1963, Elvis had appeared in It Happened at the World's Fair. This film was the film debut of Kurt Russell, 11 years old at the time of filming. In 1969, Elvis' character in Change of Habit was named John Carpenter. In 1979, Russell played the King of Rock and Roll in the TV-movie Elvis. It was directed by John Carpenter (his real name), who would also direct Russell in a few other films, including The Thing.
George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola had just founded American Zoetrope Studios, but Lucas had yet to make a full-length feature film. This was also then true of Steven Spielberg. Martin Scorcese had made 1, Who's That Knocking At My Door? Michael Douglas was 25 years old, and filming Adam at Six A.M. His future wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones, was almost 3 months old. No one had yet heard of John Shaft, Leatherface, Damien Thorn, Howard Beale, Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees or Freddy Krueger.
Television shows that debuted in that season included Room 222, Marcus Welby, M.D., Medical Center, The Brady Bunch, and kids' shows Sesame Street, H.R. Pufnstuf and Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? From Britain came the debuts of Monty Python’s Flying Circus and The Benny Hill Show.
Star Trek aired its last first-run episode 6 months earlier. As series star William Shatner put it, "We all thought it was over!" As series creator Gene Roddenberry put it, "Six weeks later, man landed on the Moon. Suddenly, traveling to space didn't seem all that strange anymore." The original show was a victim of timing.
Or was it? It was soon picked up in syndication, and, like The Honeymooners before it and The Odd Couple after it, also shown on New York's WPIX-Channel 11, it gained a massive following that it never got on its original network.
That didn't help Roddenberry -- at least, not yet. He had just gotten divorced, and had just seen his pet project get canceled, had sworn he would never write for television again, and was now writing a sexploitation film, Pretty Maids All in a Row. Despite being directed by Roger Vadim, and starring Rock Hudson, Angie Dickinson, Telly Savalas, Keenan Wynn, Roddy McDowell, Star Trek veterans James Doohan and William Campbell, and future The Secrets of Isis star Joanna Cameron, it flopped upon its 1971 release.
No one had yet heard of Keith Partridge, Archie Bunker, Kwai Chang Caine, Fred Sanford, Bob Hartley, Theo Kojak, Arthur Fonzarelli, Barney Miller, Basil Fawlty, J.R. Ewing, Mork from Ork, Jake and Elwood Blues, William Adama, Arnold Jackson, Ken Reeves, Mario and Luigi, Derek "Del Boy" Trotter, Sam Malone, Christine Cagney and Mary Beth Lacey, He-Man, Edmund Blackadder, Goku, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Thundercats, Bart Simpson, Hayden Fox, Zack Morris, Dale Cooper, The Seinfeld Four, Buffy Summers, Fox Mulder, Andy Sipowicz, Doug Ross, Alan Partridge, Ross Geller and Rachel Greene, Xena, Ash Ketchum, Carrie Bradshaw, Tony Soprano, Jed Bartlet, Master Chief, Jack Bauer, Omar Little, Michael Bluth, Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Rick Grimes, Bette Porter, Michael Scott, Don Draper, Walter White, Jax Teller, Richard Castle, Leslie Knope, Sarah Manning, Jane "Eleven" Hopper and Maggie Bell.
Robert Kardashian was in law school, Bruce Jenner was playing college football in Iowa, Kristen Mary Houghton was about to turn 14, and none of them knew each other yet.
The Number 1 song in America on the day I was born was "Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye" by Steam. They were not a real group, just a bunch of studio musicians, and the song is better known by its chorus: "Na na na na... Na na na na... hey hey hey, Goodbye!"
The month before, and it was the only month in which it would ever be true, both Elvis and the Beatles had Number 1 hits: Elvis had "Suspicious Minds" and the Beatles had the double-sided hit "Come Together" (written by John Lennon) and "Something" (which Frank Sinatra would call "the greatest love song of the last 50 years" after hailing Lennon and Paul McCartney as great songwriters, even though it was written by George Harrison).
The Supremes also had their last hit with Diana Ross, and it would become their last Number 1: "Someday We'll Be Together." Led Zeppelin had their highest-charting single (in the U.S., anyway), "Whole Lotta Love." Sinatra had hit with Paul Anka's song "My Way." Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington were still alive and performing. Bob Dylan had hit with his country-themed album Nashville Skyline, Johnny Cash had a variety show on ABC, and each helped the other's comeback when Cash invited Dylan to appear on his show.
The Jackson 5 had just had their 1st hit, putting Michael Jackson into the national consciousness for the 1st time. David Bowie was riding the success of "Space Oddity." Elton John released his debut solo album, Empty Sky. Bruce Springsteen had just formed a band named Steel Mill, Billy Joel one named Attila.
Hippies were all the rage, although they would have been shocked that it would take until 2012 for recreational marijuana use to be legal in any State. The gay rights movement had really kicked off in June, but at the time, I don't think anyone involved expected that gay marriage would be legal in their lifetimes, in even a few States.
Inflation has been such that what $1.00 would buy then, $6.82 would buy now. A U.S. postage stamp was 6 cents. A New York Subway token was 20 cents. The average prices of a gallon of gas was 35 cents, a cup of coffee 42 cents, a McDonald's meal 79 cents (49 cents of that being the recently-introduced Big Mac), a movie ticket $1.20, a new car around $2,300, and a new house $28,100. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed that day at 783.79.
There were artificial kidneys, but no artificial hearts. There were birth control pills, but no Viagra.
There was also Naked Came the Stranger by Penelope Ashe. This was a name used for a composite of 24 authors (supposedly, 19 men and 5 women), conspiring to see if a novel could be really, really bad, but still sell big if it had a lot of sex scenes in it. This was a truly late-Sixties kind of experiment – and it worked.
Major non-fiction books included the career-launching memoir I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou and the career-launching historical work Mary, Queen of Scots by Antonia Fraser.
J.R.R. Tolkein was still alive. Tom Clancy, rejected by the U.S. Army due to poor eyesight, had gone to work for an insurance company. Anne Rice was a graduate student at the University of California, having witnessed the People's Park demonstration earlier in the year. Stephen King was at the University of Maine. George R.R. Martin was at Northwestern University. John Grisham was in high school in the Mississippi suburbs of Memphis. J.K. Rowling was 4 years old, and living in Winterbourne, Gloucestershire, in the West Country of England..
No one had yet heard of John Rambo, Spenser: For Hire, George Smiley, The Punisher, Rocky Balboa, T.S. Garp, Arthur Dent, Jason Bourne, Hannibal Lecter, Celie Harris, Kinsey Millhone, Jack Ryan, Forrest Gump, John McClane, Alex Cross, Bridget Jones, Robert Langdon, Bella Swan, Lisbeth Salander or Katniss Everdeen.
The films On Her Majesty's Secret Service (George Lazenby's debut, and farewell, as James Bond) and Anne of the Thousand Days (starring Genevieve Bujold as Anne Boleyn and Richard Burton as King Henry VIII) were released on the exact day that I was born. The Adam West version of Batman
had been canceled a year and a half earlier, and Bob Holiday, in the 1966 Broadway musical It's a Bird... It's a Plane... It's Superman, was the most recent live-action Man of Steel. Jon Pertwee was about to begin playing The Doctor.
Other films out at the time were the film version of Hello, Dolly! with Barbra Streisand; They Shoot Horses, Don't They?; The Undefeated, a Western starring John Wayne and Rock Hudson; and Change of Habit, with Elvis Presley playing an inner-city doctor (seriously) who unintentionally tempts a nun played by Mary Tyler Moore. It was Elvis' last feature film, and it's one of his better ones. It was also the 1st time that Mary worked with Ed Asner, with The Mary Tyler Moore Show yet to come.
had been canceled a year and a half earlier, and Bob Holiday, in the 1966 Broadway musical It's a Bird... It's a Plane... It's Superman, was the most recent live-action Man of Steel. Jon Pertwee was about to begin playing The Doctor.
"My name is... wait, this never happened to the other fella."
Other films out at the time were the film version of Hello, Dolly! with Barbra Streisand; They Shoot Horses, Don't They?; The Undefeated, a Western starring John Wayne and Rock Hudson; and Change of Habit, with Elvis Presley playing an inner-city doctor (seriously) who unintentionally tempts a nun played by Mary Tyler Moore. It was Elvis' last feature film, and it's one of his better ones. It was also the 1st time that Mary worked with Ed Asner, with The Mary Tyler Moore Show yet to come.
Reminding The Beatles, and everybody else,
who's King around here, anyway.
In 1963, Elvis had appeared in It Happened at the World's Fair. This film was the film debut of Kurt Russell, 11 years old at the time of filming. In 1969, Elvis' character in Change of Habit was named John Carpenter. In 1979, Russell played the King of Rock and Roll in the TV-movie Elvis. It was directed by John Carpenter (his real name), who would also direct Russell in a few other films, including The Thing.
George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola had just founded American Zoetrope Studios, but Lucas had yet to make a full-length feature film. This was also then true of Steven Spielberg. Martin Scorcese had made 1, Who's That Knocking At My Door? Michael Douglas was 25 years old, and filming Adam at Six A.M. His future wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones, was almost 3 months old. No one had yet heard of John Shaft, Leatherface, Damien Thorn, Howard Beale, Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees or Freddy Krueger.
Television shows that debuted in that season included Room 222, Marcus Welby, M.D., Medical Center, The Brady Bunch, and kids' shows Sesame Street, H.R. Pufnstuf and Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? From Britain came the debuts of Monty Python’s Flying Circus and The Benny Hill Show.
Zoinks!
Star Trek aired its last first-run episode 6 months earlier. As series star William Shatner put it, "We all thought it was over!" As series creator Gene Roddenberry put it, "Six weeks later, man landed on the Moon. Suddenly, traveling to space didn't seem all that strange anymore." The original show was a victim of timing.
Or was it? It was soon picked up in syndication, and, like The Honeymooners before it and The Odd Couple after it, also shown on New York's WPIX-Channel 11, it gained a massive following that it never got on its original network.
That didn't help Roddenberry -- at least, not yet. He had just gotten divorced, and had just seen his pet project get canceled, had sworn he would never write for television again, and was now writing a sexploitation film, Pretty Maids All in a Row. Despite being directed by Roger Vadim, and starring Rock Hudson, Angie Dickinson, Telly Savalas, Keenan Wynn, Roddy McDowell, Star Trek veterans James Doohan and William Campbell, and future The Secrets of Isis star Joanna Cameron, it flopped upon its 1971 release.
No one had yet heard of Keith Partridge, Archie Bunker, Kwai Chang Caine, Fred Sanford, Bob Hartley, Theo Kojak, Arthur Fonzarelli, Barney Miller, Basil Fawlty, J.R. Ewing, Mork from Ork, Jake and Elwood Blues, William Adama, Arnold Jackson, Ken Reeves, Mario and Luigi, Derek "Del Boy" Trotter, Sam Malone, Christine Cagney and Mary Beth Lacey, He-Man, Edmund Blackadder, Goku, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Thundercats, Bart Simpson, Hayden Fox, Zack Morris, Dale Cooper, The Seinfeld Four, Buffy Summers, Fox Mulder, Andy Sipowicz, Doug Ross, Alan Partridge, Ross Geller and Rachel Greene, Xena, Ash Ketchum, Carrie Bradshaw, Tony Soprano, Jed Bartlet, Master Chief, Jack Bauer, Omar Little, Michael Bluth, Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Rick Grimes, Bette Porter, Michael Scott, Don Draper, Walter White, Jax Teller, Richard Castle, Leslie Knope, Sarah Manning, Jane "Eleven" Hopper and Maggie Bell.
Robert Kardashian was in law school, Bruce Jenner was playing college football in Iowa, Kristen Mary Houghton was about to turn 14, and none of them knew each other yet.
The Number 1 song in America on the day I was born was "Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye" by Steam. They were not a real group, just a bunch of studio musicians, and the song is better known by its chorus: "Na na na na... Na na na na... hey hey hey, Goodbye!"
The month before, and it was the only month in which it would ever be true, both Elvis and the Beatles had Number 1 hits: Elvis had "Suspicious Minds" and the Beatles had the double-sided hit "Come Together" (written by John Lennon) and "Something" (which Frank Sinatra would call "the greatest love song of the last 50 years" after hailing Lennon and Paul McCartney as great songwriters, even though it was written by George Harrison).
Ironically, the one who this photo was said to have "proved" he was dead,
and is holding a cigarette, in this photo, is still alive.
The Supremes also had their last hit with Diana Ross, and it would become their last Number 1: "Someday We'll Be Together." Led Zeppelin had their highest-charting single (in the U.S., anyway), "Whole Lotta Love." Sinatra had hit with Paul Anka's song "My Way." Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington were still alive and performing. Bob Dylan had hit with his country-themed album Nashville Skyline, Johnny Cash had a variety show on ABC, and each helped the other's comeback when Cash invited Dylan to appear on his show.
The Jackson 5 had just had their 1st hit, putting Michael Jackson into the national consciousness for the 1st time. David Bowie was riding the success of "Space Oddity." Elton John released his debut solo album, Empty Sky. Bruce Springsteen had just formed a band named Steel Mill, Billy Joel one named Attila.
Hippies were all the rage, although they would have been shocked that it would take until 2012 for recreational marijuana use to be legal in any State. The gay rights movement had really kicked off in June, but at the time, I don't think anyone involved expected that gay marriage would be legal in their lifetimes, in even a few States.
A noted photo from Woodstock, August 17, 1969. Bobbi Kelly and Nick Ercoline.
The same couple now. They married in 1971, and are still together.
Inflation has been such that what $1.00 would buy then, $6.82 would buy now. A U.S. postage stamp was 6 cents. A New York Subway token was 20 cents. The average prices of a gallon of gas was 35 cents, a cup of coffee 42 cents, a McDonald's meal 79 cents (49 cents of that being the recently-introduced Big Mac), a movie ticket $1.20, a new car around $2,300, and a new house $28,100. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed that day at 783.79.
Photo of unidentified people taken from Ellis Island, 1969.
Note the original World Trade Center under construction.
The tallest building in the world was the Empire State Building, but the World Trade Center complex was under construction. There were no portable telephones, unless you count car phones. Only about half of American homes had color television sets. There were no video games -- there were arcades, but they were still based on pinball machines, as told in The Who's rock opera of that year, Tommy.
There were artificial kidneys, but no artificial hearts. There were birth control pills, but no Viagra.
Credit cards were still a relatively new thing, and the 1st automatic teller machine in America had just gone into operation. There were no tabletop, let alone desktop or laptop, computers. Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and Tim Berners-Lee were all 14 years old. But at least then, we could legitimately say, "We can put a man on the Moon, so why can't we... ?"
Toward the end of 1969, the first draft lottery of the Vietnam War era was held. The 1st Boeing 747 made its maiden flight, from Seattle to New York. Black Panther Party members Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were assassinated by Chicago police officers. Labor leader Jock Yablonski was assassinated on the order of a rival.
And 2 people were murdered at a rock concert at the Altamont Speedway in California's East Bay region, while the Rolling Stones sang "Gimme Shelter," thus providing both a stark contrast to Woodstock 4 months earlier and a painful end to the 1960s for rock and roll fans.
Toward the end of 1969, the first draft lottery of the Vietnam War era was held. The 1st Boeing 747 made its maiden flight, from Seattle to New York. Black Panther Party members Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were assassinated by Chicago police officers. Labor leader Jock Yablonski was assassinated on the order of a rival.
And 2 people were murdered at a rock concert at the Altamont Speedway in California's East Bay region, while the Rolling Stones sang "Gimme Shelter," thus providing both a stark contrast to Woodstock 4 months earlier and a painful end to the 1960s for rock and roll fans.
Joseph Kennedy Sr., and Josef von Sternberg, and Ruth White, an actress from Perth Amboy, New Jersey who had recently appeared in Midnight Cowboy, died. (She was 55 and had cancer, while the others were much older.) Shawn Carter (a.k.a. Jay-Z), and Kristy Swanson (the 1st Buffy the Vampire Slayer), and Julie Delpy were born. And, on the exact same day that I was born, so was a Major League Baseball player, Joe Randa, a 3rd baseman who played from 1995 to 2006, mostly for the Kansas City Royals.
Joe Randa
That's what life was like when I was born, on December 18, 1969. It was a different time.
Aren't they all?
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