Major Stories

January 1: Nixon henchmen H.R. Haldeman, John Erlichman, John Mitchell, and Robert Maridian are convicted in the Watergate conspiracy.

January 8: Watergate figures John Dean, Herbert Kalmbach and Jeb Magruder are released from prison.

January 12: The Pittsburgh Steelers defeated the Minnesota Vikings 16-6 to win their first Super Bowl.

January 17: China officially adopts a new constitution.

January 31: Nixon's former counsel Charles Colson is released from prison.

February 11: Margaret Thatcher becomes the first woman to lead a British political party by being elected leader of the Conservative party.

February 27: Nearly four years after J. Edgar Hoover's death, Attorney General Levi confirms that the FBI kept secret files on the private lives of presidents, congressmen, and others by Hoover's order.

March 12: Former Nixon cabinet member and chief fundraiser Maurice Stans pleads guilty to violating federal campaign finance laws.

April 13: President Ngarta Tombaibaye of Chad is killed during a military coup.

April 17: Former secretary of the treasury John Connally is acquitted of bribery.

April 23: Having lost, President Ford announces the end of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam war.

April 30: South Vietnam surrenders to the Communists in the north ending the war in Vietnam.

June 5: Egypt's Anwar Sadat officially reopens the Suez Canal, which has been closed since the end of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

June 24: An Eastern Airlines 727 crashes while landing at New York's JFK Airport killing 113 passengers and crew.

July 15: The the joint U.S.-Soviet Apollo-Soyuz space mission begins.

July 31: Jimmy Hoffa, former president of the Teamsters, is reported missing in Detroit.

September 5: Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, a former follower of Charles Manson is arrested after pointing a gun at President Ford in Sacramento.

September 18: Patty Hearst is arrested by the FBI ending a 19 month search.

September 22: Sara Jane Moore attempts to assassinate President Ford in San Francisco but Ford escapes unharmed.

October 22: The Cincinnati Reds defeat the Boston Red Sox in game 7 to win the World Series.

November 3: In a reorganization of his cabinet, President Ford announces that George Bush will succeed William Colby as CIA directory and Brent Scowcroft will replace Henry Kissinger as National Security Council director.

November 10: The UN approves a resolution equating Zionism with racism by a 72-35 vote.

November 20: Dictator Francisco Franco of Spain dies.

November 20: A Senate select committee investigating the CIA reports that U.S. officials had participated in plots to kill foreign leaders.

December 19: John Paul Stevens is sworn in as a Supreme Court Justice replacing William O. Douglas, who retired in November due to poor health.

December 29: A bomb at New York's LaGuardia Airport explodes killing 11 and injuring 75.