October 1, 1975, 50 years ago: Heavyweight Champion Muhammad Ali fights former Heavyweight Champion Joe Frazier for the 3rd time, at the Araneta Coliseum in Quezon City, the capital of the Philippines. Quezon City is the national capital, and the arena is located about 5 miles east of the country's largest city, Manila.
It becomes known as "The Thrilla in Manila." Frazier said he hit Ali with punches that would have brought down buildings. Ali said he had never come so close to death. In the 13th round, an Ali punch sent Frazier's mouth-guard flying. The 14th round was even more brutal. Frazier's corner wouldn't let him go out for the 15th and final round. The fight was declared over. Ali raised his arm in triumph, and then collapsed.
Both men should have retired after that fight. Howard Cosell, who broadcast it for ABC, said, "A big part of Ali remained inside that ring."
That same day, in Memphis, a man broke into the home of Al Jackson Jr., the drummer for Booker T. & The M.G.'s, looking to burglarize it. Jackson confronts him, and is shot and killed. He was only 39 years old.
It was some kind of a fight. It began some kind of a month.
*
October 2: Chevrolet introduces its "subcompact" car, the Chevette. And W.T. Grant department stores files for bankruptcy. They had a store in my hometown of East Brunswick, New Jersey. Oddly enough, the space was bought by a theater chain named Grant's, so they kept the sign over the front door. The new theater was named Movie City Five, and I worked there in 1988.
October 3: A siege ends at the Spaghetti House restaurant in Knightsbridge, London. Franklin Davies, a Nigerian student, led 2 other gunmen in an attempted armed robbery of the restaurant, where managers of the chain had assembled to pay in the week's takings of approximately £13,000. When the armed robbery did not go to plan, 9 Italian staff members were taken hostage, and moved into the basement. Another staff member escaped and raised the alarm, leading to a siege of 6 days.
The robbers and their captives emerged unharmed. As with the recent film Dog Day Afternoon, about a 1972 Brooklyn robbery, a film was made about it, Spaghetti House.
October 5: The Svenska Hockeyligan begins play in Sweden. And actresses Kate Winslet and Parminder Nagra are born.
October 6: For the 1st time, major U.S. TV networks declined a request to interrupt programming to broadcast a speech by the President. The nationwide address by Gerald Ford is carried only by ABC, not by NBC, CBS or PBS.
Four days earlier, Ford had vetoed an extension of the federal school lunch and nutrition program, On October 7, both houses of Congress overwhelmingly voted to override that veto, 397-18 in the House and 79-13 in the Senate, and make it law.
With the combination of inflation and recession, known as "stagflation," and the lingering anger over his pardon the year before of his predecessor, Richard Nixon, Ford is very unpopular, including among many of his fellow Republicans, who believe he is not conservative enough. And he has to face election for a term of his own in 13 months, with Primaries starting in 4 months.
October 7: Former Beatle John Lennon gets his deportation order overruled in federal court. He can now stay in America for as long as he wants. Sean Ono Lennon, his son with Yoko Ono, is born 2 days later.
Both of Major League Baseball's Pennants are decided. The Boston Red Sox beat the Oakland Athletics, 5-3 at the Oakland Coliseum, completing a 3-game sweep of the American League Championship Series, and ending a 3-year Pennant streak for the A's. Team owner Charlie Finley was too cheap to live up to his contract with pitcher Jim "Catfish" Hunter, and lost him to free agency. But with the Sox sweeping the series, it's hard to say that Hunter would have made much of a difference.
The A's had still won 5 straight titles in the AL Western Division. But before the next regular season began, Finley would trade his best player, Reggie Jackson, and the breakup of his dynasty was on.
And the Cincinnati Reds completed a sweep in the National League Championship Series, beating the Pittsburgh Pirates, 5-3 in 10 innings. It is the Reds' 3rd Pennant in 6 seasons, but they haven't won a World Series in 35 years. They will face the Red Sox, who haven't won one in 57 years. Something's got to give.
October 8: Kim Dae-doo, with 17 kills South Korea's all-time leading serial killer, is arrested. Doug Jarvis makes his NHL debut with the Montreal Canadiens, and eventually plays in 964 consecutive games, setting a record (since broken). And President Ford signs a bill allowing women into the U.S. military service academies: The Army at West Point, New York; the Naval Academy (which also trains officers for the Marine Corps) at Annapolis, Maryland; the Air Force at Colorado Springs, Colorado; and the Coast Guard at Kings Point, New York.
October 10: For the 2nd time, actors Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton marry. It lasts for 9 months. It was the 6th of 8 marriages for Liz, the 3rd of 5 for Dick.
*
October 11: Bill Clinton marries Hillary Rodham in Little Rock, the capital of Arkansas. A little more than a year later, Bill was elected to office for the first time, as Attorney General of the State. Despite everything, not only are the Clintons still together, but, unlike many of their detractors, they are each still on their 1st marriage.
That afternoon, Game 1 of the World Series is played at Fenway Park in Boston. With the game scoreless in the bottom of the 7th inning, Red Sox pitcher Luis Tiant -- who, due to the designated hitter, had only come to bat once all season -- got a hit, and ended up scoring the 1st of 6 runs in the inning. He finished the game with a 5-hit shutout. The Red Sox won, 6-0, and took a surprising lead in the series.
That night, NBC premieres a new late night variety program, titled Saturday Night. The title made sense, as NBC already had shows titled Today, Tonight and Tomorrow.
Lorne Michaels created, produced and directed it. The original cast, known as "The Not Ready for Prime Time Players," were John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, Garrett Morris, Michael O'Donoghue, Golden Radner, Jane Curtin and Laraine Newman.
The 1st guest host was George Carlin. In spite of the late hour (11:30 PM), he did not do his routine "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television." He did, however, open with a parody of The Lord's Prayer": "Our Father, whose art is in Heaven, hollow be thy name." He also did his routine comparing "Baseball and Football." The 1st musical guest was Billy Preston.
At the end of the 1st season, when a similarly titled show, on ABC, hosted by, of all people, Howard Cosell, is canceled, the NBC show adopts the BBC show's name: Saturday Night Live. Chase left, replaced by Bill Murray.
*
October 12: The Reds bounce back, winning Game 2, 3-2, with Dave Concepción and Ken Griffey Sr. each driving in a run in the top of the 9th, tying the series.
And Marion Jones is born. She went on to star on the women's basketball team at the University of North Carolina, winning the 1994 National Championship. At the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, she won 3 Gold Medals and 2 Bronze Medals as a sprinter, but was disqualified from each for using performance-enhancing drugs. In 2010, at the age of 36, she made a comeback of sorts, playing the 1st of 2 seasons with the WNBA's Tulsa Shock.
October 13: Charles "Swede" Risberg, the last survivor of the 8 Chicago White Sox players who "threw" the 1919 World Series, died. And the U.S. Mint released the Bicentennial Dollar coin, replacing the image of the Apollo 11 logo, the eagle landing on the Moon, with an image of the Liberty Bell superimposed over the entire Moon.
The Bicentennial Half-Dollar had already been released, with Independence Hall in Philadelphia replacing the Great Seal of the United States. So had the Bicentennial Quarter, with a Revolutionary War drummer boy replacing the eagle. Aside from a date of "1776-1976," no changes were made to the front: Dwight D. Eisenhower would be on the dollar, as he had since 1971 and would be until 1978; John F. Kennedy would be on the half-dollar, as he had since 1964; and George Washington would be on the quarter, as he had since 1962.
October 14: The World Series moved to Cincinnati for Games 3, 4 and 5. Game 3 went to a 10th inning, marked by a controversial play involving Cincinnati's Ed Armbrister and Boston's Carlton Fisk: Armbrister, a backup outfielder, lays down a sacrifice bunt, and seemingly hesitates breaking out of the batter's box; Fisk's subsequent throwing error leads to the Reds' winning run. The Sox scream for an interference call from umpire Larry Barnett‚ but to no avail.
The Reds hang on to win, 6-5. Tony Kubek, former Yankee shortstop and now one of the NBC broadcasters, says on the air that Barnett blew the call. Barnett ends up getting thousands of angry letters, some of them death threats, nearly all of them from the New England States. Had instant replay been in effect at the time, there would not have been enough evidence of intentional interference to overturn the call.
October 15: The Red Sox win Game 4, 5-4. They score all 5 runs in the 4th inning, giving Tiant his 2nd win of the series. And Elgin Baylor Lumpkin, named for a basketball legend, is born. He grew up to become the rapper Ginuwine.
October 16: Game 5 is the only game of the Series that ends up not being close. The Red win, 6-2, thanks to 2 home runs by Tony Pérez.
Game 6 is supposed to be played in Boston on October 18. But it starts raining in New England. And it rains, and rains, and rains...
It is not a good time for sports' "rebel leagues." As it turns out, the American Basketball Association is in its last season, and 4 of its teams will be absorbed into the NBA within a year. The Baltimore Claws will not be one of them. On this day, they play an exhibition game, losing to the Norfolk-based Virginia Squires. Only 500 people come out to the Baltimore Civic Center (now the CFG Bank Arena). Three days later, unable to make their rent, never mind their payroll, they fold without playing a regular-season game.
The Utah Stars would not be one of the absorbed teams, either: On October 18, they beat the NBA's Milwaukee Bucks in an exhibition game at the Salt Palace in Salt Lake City, but they ended up folding in December.
The World Hockey Association is not doing well, either. But they're doing better than the World Football League, which plays its last games on:
October 19: The Birmingham Vulcans, winners of the previous season's title under the Birmingham Americans name, beat the Memphis Southmen, 21-0 at Legion Field in Birmingham. The Shreveport Steamer (no S on the end) beat the San Antonio Wings, 41-31 at Independence Stadium in Shreveport. The Portland Thunder beat the Jacksonville Express, 30-13 at Civic Stadium (now Providence Park) in Portland. And in the very last game, the Southern California Sun beat The Hawaiians, 26-7 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim).
On October 21, the WFL folded. And it wasn't the biggest sports story of the day. The WFL couldn't even die with dignity.
October 20: Two subway trains collide in Mexico City, killing 43 people. It's the worst accident in the history of the Mexico City Metro, and it remains the worst urban transit accident in North America since the Malbone Street Wreck in Brooklyn in 1918.
*
October 21: Tom Waits releases his album Nighthawks at the Diner, including the song “Eggs and Sausage.” In that song, he sings, "Baby, you gotta understand, I'm in a graveyard charade, a spaceship masquerade." Good metaphors for the 1970s.
Finally, the rain lets up, for what Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy called "a brilliant autumn day in New England." That night, Game 6 of the World Series could finally be played at Fenway Park.
The delay gives Luis Tiant enough rest to start for the 3rd time. Sox fans loved him for his effective pitching and his twisty windup. He loved himself just as much: He would stand in the shower, smoking a cigar, looking at himself in a mirror, seeing his bald head and huge mustache, and saying, in heavily-accented English, "Damn, I am a gooood-looooking son of a biiiitch!"
He looked good for 4 innings, pitching a shutout and benefiting from a 3-run home run by Fred Lynn, who went on to become the 1st player ever to win either League's Rookie of the Year and its Most Valuable Player award in the same season. But he faltered in the 7th, and the Reds took a 3-0 lead in the top of the 8th. In the bottom of the 8th, Bernie Carbo, whom the Reds had traded away, hit a drive to straightaway center field, for a 3-run homer, tying the game, 6-6.
The game went to extra innings. Leading off the top of the 11th, the Reds' Pete Rose said to Red Sox catcher Carlton Fisk, "Some kind of a game, isn't it?" It wasn't just some kind of a game: It was some kind of a month.
Fisk led off the bottom of the 12th. At 12:34 AM on October 22, he hit a drive off Pat Darcy, down the right-field line, that looked like it might go foul. As though it would actually influence the flight of the ball, Fisk waved his arms to his right. The ball hit the pole near its top, for a home run. Final score, Boston 7, Cincinnati 6. The Series was tied, and would go to a Game 7.
John Kiley, the organist at Fenway Park (and also at the Boston Garden, thus the answer to the corny old trivia question about "the only man to play for the Red Sox, Celtics and Bruins"), played George Friedrich Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus." Then he played "Stout-Hearted Men." Then he played "The Beer Barrel Polka." ("Roll out the barrel, we'll have a barrel of fun.") Then he played "Seventy-six Trombones" from the Broadway musical The Music Man. (I have no idea why he played that one.)
The shot of Fisk thinking he can wave the ball fair, which I've dubbed the Fenway Twist, is the most familiar clip in the history of televised sports. (As they had with every World Series since 1947, NBC was televising it, although they would begin to alternate with ABC starting with the 1977 season, until 1989.)
October 22: Historian Arnold Toynbee dies. Modern Family actor Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Spanish soccer star Míchel Salgado are born. Venera 9, a Soviet space probe, lands on the planet Venus, and sends to Earth the 1st photographs of the surface of another planet.
And Game 7 of the 1975 World Series is played at Fenway Park. Reds manager George "Sparky" Anderson started Don Gullett, and said, "No matter who wins, my starting pitcher is going to the Hall of Fame." Red Sox manager Darrell Johnson started Bill Lee, who, asked about Anderson's statement, said, "No matter who wins, I'm going to the Eliot Lounge." That was a famous Boston bar, since gone out of business. Gullett would be kept out of the Hall of Fame by shoulder woes.
He was kept from being the winning pitcher in this game by allowing 3 runs in the bottom of the 3rd inning, including an RBI single by Carl Yastrzemski and back-to-back bases-loaded walks to Rico Petrocelli and Dwight Evans.
Lee kept his shutout through 5 innings. He allowed a single to Rose to lead off the top of the 6th, then got 2 outs. Then he made the biggest mistake in Red Sox history. He had been experimenting with a blooper pitch, and had used it with some success in this game. This time, he threw it to Tony Pérez, who knocked it far over the Green Monster, Fenway's left field wall, 37 feet high and 315 feet from home plate. (Or so it was labeled at the time. It was eventually relabeled 310, and some people believe it's even closer than that.) Cincinnati 3, Boston 2.
The Reds tied the game in the 7th. Cliché Alert: Walks can kill you, especially the leadoff variety. Jim Burton walked Griffey to start the top of the 9th. César Gerónimo bunted him over to 2nd base. One out, but now, the run that would win the World Series was in scoring position. Dan Driessen grounded out. Two out, but now, the run that would win the World Series was in scoring position. Burton walked Rose to keep the inning alive. Joe Morgan was up, and he blooped a single into short center field, scoring Griffey. In the bottom of the 9th, Will McEnaney got Juan Beníquez to fly to right, Bob Montgomery to ground to short, and Yastrzemski to fly to center.
Cincinnati 4, Boston 3, both in this game and in the World Series. Not only has Game 6 been called baseball's "Greatest Game Ever Played," but the Series has been called the best World Series ever. At any rate, the Big Red Machine had their title, and their validation. The Red Sox, and all of New England, would have to wait.
*
October 25: In England's Football League, West Ham United, of the East End of London, hosted Manchester United, beating them, 2-1. A fight between 2 of the biggest hooligan "firms" in England, West Ham's Inter-City Firm (ICF) and Man U's Cockney Reds, based in London but fans of Man U due to their television exposure during the 1960s, led to 102 people being injured, and 38 arrested. England's hooligan problem would get worse before it got better.
And in Los Angeles, Elton John -- by this point, a part-owner of his hometown soccer team, Watford Football Club in Hertfordshire -- plays the 1st of 2 sold-out concerts at Dodger Stadium. He wears a sequined Dodger uniform, with "ELTON" and the Number 1 on the back, designed by CBS costume wizard Bob Mackie.
October 27: Rex Stout, creator of the fictional private detective Nero Wolfe, dies. And, for the 1st time, the weekly news magazines Time and Newsweek put the same person on their covers. It's not a major figure in domestic or international politics, or a renowned scientist, or a beloved humanitarian. It's a rock and roll star: Bruce Springsteen, riding the success of his album Born to Run.
October 28: Georges Carpentier dies. He had been a hero in World War I, and the Light Heavyweight Champion of the World. In 1921, he fought Heavyweight Champion Jack Dempsey at a temporary stadium called Boyle's Thirty Acres in Jersey City, New Jersey, for the heavyweight title, and it became boxing's 1st gate of over $1 million. Dempsey won by knockout.
That same day, having been admitted the day before, I underwent surgery at the Hospital for Joint Diseases, then located at 1919 Madison Avenue, at 123rd Street, in Manhattan's Spanish Harlem, to correct a problem in my legs that made walking difficult.
My 2 weeks in that hospital were a blur, as I was almost 6 years old. What I do remember from the experience, I wouldn't wish on anyone. I've been a hospital patient on Halloween Night at age 5, and I've been a hospital patient on Thanksgiving Day at age 17. Halloween at 5 in a hospital is worse.
A follow-up surgery was performed on July 12, 1976. This time, I left the hospital after 1 week. Both times, it was in a wheelchair.
As with the previous one, the surgery was successful, to an extent. But the problem, caused by a birth defect, wouldn't go away. I still developed arthritis, and the pain in my legs frequently made walking a chore. I told myself that, one day, I would walk out of that hospital. I was walking within a few weeks.
In 1979, Joint Diseases moved into a new building, at 301 East 17th Street, off 2nd Avenue, as part of New York University's Langone Orthopedic Hospital. In 2006, it was fully absorbed into the NYU Langone system. Its old building is now an apartment building, with the ground floor occupied by another health care facility, the Ralph Lauren Cancer Center. Finally, in 2018, I walked into their new building, and, symbolically, walked out of it. In 2019, I went back up to their old one, and did the same.
It was something I had to do, and, finally, I did it. It was, both figuratively and literally, a moving experience.
In 2020, I had my right hip replaced; in 2021, the left. So much pain was gone.
But I have no memory of what was going on in the outside world during those 2 weeks, which was plenty -- including in the City around me.
Also on October 28, President Ford convinced Vice President Nelson Rockefeller to drop out of a place on the Republican Party's 1976 ticket. The conservative wing of the Party had never trusted him. Ford ended up choosing Senator Bob Dole of Kansas.
October 29: Ford tells the National Press Club that he would veto any legislation for a federal bailout of New York City, which was in desperate financial straits.
In rebuilding mode, hockey's New York Rangers put their popular goaltender, Eddie Giacomin, on waivers. On October 31, he was claimed by the Detroit Red Wings. According to legend, the Rangers' next game was against those very Red Wings. It's not true: On November 1, they played the Canadiens in Montreal, and lost, 4-0. But the next game, their 1st home game after the waiver claim, on November 2, was at The Garden against the Wings, and Davidson and Giacomin were the opposing starting goalies.
All game long, Ranger fans chanted, "Ed-DIE! Ed-DIE! Ed-DIE!" They cheered when he made a save. They cheered when the Wings scored. They booed when their own players scored. The Wings won, 6-4, and the Ranger fans gave Giacomin a standing ovation.
On November 7, the Rangers traded beloved veterans Jean Ratelle and Brad Park to the hated Boston Bruins for Phil Esposito and Carol Vadnais. Both teams' fans hated "The Trade."
October 30: The New York Daily News, responding to Ford's statement that he wouldn't allow the federal government to bail out New York City's desperate finances, prints the most famous newspaper headline ever: "FORD TO CITY: DROP DEAD." Ford didn't actually say that, but that was the message he sent, intentionally or otherwise.
But Ford was damned when he did, and damned when he didn't. The bailout he actually did sign infuriated many conservatives, who already had a few problems with the mildly conservative Ford, and they voted for former Governor Ronald Reagan of California in the Republican primaries, and Reagan very nearly won the GOP nomination, and when Ford won the nomination anyway, many of those conservatives stayed home on Election Day, November 2, 1976.
This may have made the difference in throwing some States, including New York, to the Democratic nominee, former Governor Jimmy Carter of Georgia. White conservatives in Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, Long Island and Westchester abandoned him. Not that they voted for Carter (Southern or not, conservative by Democratic standards or not, they still viewed all Democrats as "socialists"), but they didn't vote at all.
It also upset undecided voters and disaffected Democrats. A lot of people remembered only the headline, and forgot that Ford changed his mind about the bailout, and held it against him, and a lot of people in the City who might not have been comfortable with Carter either voted for Carter or stayed home, enough to throw the State of New York to Carter. It may have made, literally, all the difference in the world. Had Ford simply won the State, he would have won a full term.
True, the Nixon pardon, lingering feelings over Watergate, the shaky economy, his debate gaffe about Eastern Europe, and conservatives issues with him over things like foreign policy and federal spending also hurt him.
Also on this day, Wilma McCann was murdered in Leeds, England. She would later be determined to be the 1st victim of Peter Sutcliffe, arrested as the "Yorkshire Ripper" in 1981. He would be convicted of 13 murders.
Martha Moxley was murdered the same day, in Greenwich, Connecticut. She was 15 years old, as was Michael Skakel, who was accused of the murder. He was a nephew of Ethel Kennedy, widow of Robert F. Kennedy. It took 24 years for him to be indicted for it. He was finally convicted in 2002. He was released in 2013 and received an order for a new trial. He was convicted again in 2016, but remained free upon appeal. In 2018, the Connecticut Supreme Court vacated his conviction. As of October 1, 2025, he is out of prison, and still professes his innocence.
October 31: The British rock band Queen release their single "Bohemian Rhapsody," from their album A Night at the Opera. It was entirely written by lead singer Freddie Mercury, produced by Roy Thomas Baker, and recorded at Rockfield Studios 1 at Rockfield, Monmouth, Wales, about 37 miles northeast of the Welsh capital of Cardiff, and 154 miles west of London.
The 1970s were Schrödinger's Decade. There was too much Republican competence, too much oil, too much crimefighting, too much television, too much overwrought music, disco and otherwise; and, overall, too many ridiculous distractions from it all... and, at the same time, not enough of those things.
October 1975 was some kind of a month.
November wouldn't get any less strange. On the 5th, The Sex Pistols gave their 1st concert, in London. On the 7th, The New Original Wonder Woman, starring Lynda Carter, premiered on ABC. On the 10th, the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sank in Lake Superior, taking all 29 hands with them.
On the 11th, Australia's Governor-General, without getting permission from the head of state he represented, Queen Elizabeth II, fired the Prime Minister, Edward Gough Whitlam over a budget bill. And Portugal grants independence to the African land of Angola, which immediately breaks out into a civil war that lasts for 27 years.
On the 20th, Francisco Franco, Fascist dictator of Spain for 36 years, died. As Chevy Chase said on Saturday Night (Live) every week, "Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead!" Spain moved toward democracy, and, while it has since elected conservative governments, it has never again had a Fascist government.
