March 1977


The following events occurred in March 1977:

March 1, 1977 (Tuesday)

  • The crash of a Yemen Airlines flight killed all 19 people on board. Shortly after taking off from Aden with a destination of Sayun, the Douglas DC-3 airplane plunged into the Indian Ocean.
  • India's unpopular Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was booed and jeered by tens of thousands of government workers as she spoke at a campaign rally in New Delhi, and thousands walked out. The Indian press noted that no Prime Minister of India had ever been booed in the capital. Mrs. Gandhi had been making a 20-minute speech to defend her 1975 proclamation of a state of emergency, as well as to justify her government's programs for family planning by sterilization and the demolition of slum housing occupied by impoverished residents.
  • East Germany doubled the toll for a car to cross from West Berlin into East Berlin in order to discourage visits, raising the cost from 10 West German marks to 20.
  • With only three more states necessary for the proposed Equal Rights Amendment to become part of the U.S. Constitution, the North Carolina state senate rejected the resolution. Although the vote in favor was 26 to 24, a two-thirds majority of at least 34 votes was required. On March 15, the state senate of Missouri, which had rejected the ERA in 1975, had only a 12 to 22 vote in favor.
  • The Bank of America began the replacement of its BankAmericard credit cards to Visa cards, initially with both names on the card, starting with all cards with cards with an expiration date of March 1977.
  • The Police, a rock trio made up of vocalist and bassist Sting, guitarist Andy Summers and drummer Stewart Copeland, gave its first public performance, a 10-minute set at the Alexandria Club in Newport, Wales
  • Born: Rens Blom, Dutch pole vaulter and 2005 world champion; in Munstergeleen
  • Died: Alioune Dramé, 49, Planning Minister for the African nation of Guinea until his arrest in 1976, died from a slow execution by starvation, after being accused of attempting to overthrow President Sékou Touré.

March 2, 1977 (Wednesday)

March 3, 1977 (Thursday)

March 4, 1977 (Friday)

March 5, 1977 (Saturday)

  • "Ask President Carter", the first and only radio show allowing ordinary residents across the U.S. to call the President of the United States, was broadcast live on the CBS Radio Network. With CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite serving as moderator, U.S. President Jimmy Carter spoke with 42 people who had been able to get through to the White House after calling a special "900" number paid for by CBS.
  • Japan became only the third nation to place a satellite into geosynchronous orbit, after easing the spacecraft into position over Indonesia. The launch marked the 10th satellite put into orbit by Japan.
  • Born: Adler Volmar, U.S. and Haitian judo athlete; in Miami
  • Died: Tom Pryce, 27, the only Welsh racecar driver to win a Formula One race, was killed along with a race official while racing in the South African Grand Prix in Midrand.

March 6, 1977 (Sunday)

  • Voters in the U.S. territory of the Northern Mariana Islands overwhelmingly approved the proposed constitution to establish the Northern Marianas as a self-governing Commonwealth within the United States. With a 58.5% turnout of the 6,500 registered voters, the result was 3,557 for and 258 against. The constitution would come into effect on January 9, 1978.
  • The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee revealed that U.S. military leaders had considered using the atomic bomb in 1953 during the Korean War, releasing a transcript of closed-door testimony to the Committee made by U.S. Army General Omar N. Bradley on February 10, 1953. General Bradley had told the Committee members, "We have discussed many times the use of the atomic bomb, tactically," but added, "Of course, you know there are no strategic targets worth mentioning in Korea. We have looked... and it is rather hard to find a target at this time that we think is sufficiently remunerative as a target for the expending out of the stockpile."

March 7, 1977 (Monday)

March 8, 1977 (Tuesday)

March 9, 1977 (Wednesday)

March 10, 1977 (Thursday)

March 11, 1977 (Friday)

  • Brazil's Foreign Ministry announced that the South American nation was canceling its 1952 military assistance treaty with the United States, after the U.S. State Department had delivered a report of human rights abuses by the Brazilian government.
  • The Hanafi Muslim takeover of three buildings in Washington ended as Hamaas Abdul Khaalis ordered 134 hostages released after negotiations with Washington police and diplomats from several Muslim nations, including Iran's ambassador to the U.S., Ardeshir Zahedi, and Pakistan's Ambassador Sahabzada Yaqub Khan. As part of the negotiations, four of the 12 terrorists, including Khaalis, were released without having to post bond. The 12 would be convicted in July on 139 of 373 counts arising from the crime.
  • Film director Roman Polanski was arrested by the Los Angeles Police Department at his room at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel on charges of raping a 13-year-old girl the night before at the Bel-Air home of actor Jack Nicholson. Nicholson had been out of town during the incident and no charges were filed against him.
  • Born: Becky Hammon, American basketball player, WNBA all-star on six teams between 2003 and 2011, and the second woman in NBA history to serve as an assistant coach ; in Rapid City, South Dakota
  • Died:
  • *Carlo Felice Buzio, 110, Italian aviation engineer and supercentenarian known for designing the Macchi L.2 and other war planes for the Italian Navy during World War One
  • *Ulysses S. Grant IV, 83, American paleontologist and grandson of U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant

March 12, 1977 (Saturday)

  • The U.S. Senate released reports on human rights abuses in 82 world nations that were receiving military aid from the United States, three of which— Ethiopia, Argentina and Uruguay— had been cut off completely because of their rights record. The reports had been mandated by an amendment to the 1976 budget bill for American foreign aid.
  • The Communist government of the Lao People's Democratic Republic arrested the nation's last King of Laos, Savang Vatthana and former Crown Prince Vong Savang, charging them and two other people of masterminding a rebel attack. Savang had been forced by the Pathet Lao to abdicate the throne on December 2, 1975. Savang Vatthana, Queen Khamphoui and Vong Savang were deported to a prison camp at Phong Saly province.
  • Turkish journalist Taner Akçam, incarcerated in Ankara for sedition connected with his writings about Turkey's treatment of the Kurdish minority, escaped from Ankara Central Prison after digging a hole using the leg of an iron stove. He fled to West Germany and was granted citizenship and freedom to continue his political activities.
  • Yeungjin University opened in South Korea at Daegu as Yeungin Technical School, becoming a college in 1985.

March 13, 1977 (Sunday)

  • The first "Wet 'n Wild "water park", an amusement park chain that only featured water attractions for swimmers, was opened in Orlando, Florida as an idea from George Millay, who had created the SeaWorld marine mammal theme park.
  • The Sikorsky S-76, the first American-made helicopter developed specifically for civilian rather than military use, made its first flight.
  • Born: Kay Tse, Hong Kong Cantopop singer; in Tai Po, Hong Kong
  • Died: Jan Patočka, 69, Czech human rights activist, died of a cerebral hemorrhage 10 days after he had become ill while being interrogated for 12 hours by Czechoslovakian security police over his involvement with the Charter 77 manifesto.

March 14, 1977 (Monday)

  • Sanjay Gandhi, the controversial son of India's Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and a candidate for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, was unhurt after an assassination attempt against him in the impoverished district of Amethi in Uttar Pradesh.
  • The second longest hijacking in world history, spanning over, began when an Italian passenger on an Iberia Air Lines flight hijacked the Boeing 727 in Spain shortly after it took off from Barcelona on a short flight to the resort of Palma de Majorca. Luciano Porcari, who had managed to bring two rifles and a pistol on the flight, then ordered the crew to fly to Algiers for refueling, than to Abidjan in the Ivory Coast, where authorities met his demand to get his 3-year-old daughter and $140,000 ransom. From Abidjan, the plane flew back to Spain and landed in Seville, then flew to Italy where it landed in Turin, where a 6-year-old daughter lived. Porcari freed five adults and two children, but his wife refused his demand for the second child, and he ordered the flight to fly to Switzerland, where seven more hostages were freed in Zürich. Returning to Turin to try talking with his wife a second time, Porcari then sought to fly to the U.S.S.R. with his 22 hostages, but the exhausted crew refused to fly further after the 727 landed in Warsaw for refueling in Poland. After traveling a third time to Turin, the flight was diverted to Switzerland and landed in Zürich to get a new crew. Two Swiss policemen, posing as a pilot and co-pilot, overpowered Porcari and retook the airplane, 44 hours after it had departed Barcelona.
  • Born:
  • * Matthew Booth, South African footballer with 37 caps for the national team as its only white player from 1999 to 2010; in Fish Hoek, Western Cape
  • * Kim Nam-il, South Korean footballer with 98 caps for the national team; in Incheon
  • * Naoki Matsuda, Japanese footballer with 40 caps for the national team; in Kiryu, Gunma prefecture
  • Died: Fannie Lou Hamer, 59, African-American civil rights activist known for coining the phrase "sick and tired of being sick and tired", died of complications from hypertension and breast cancer.

March 15, 1977 (Tuesday)

  • Dan Margalit, an investigative reporter covering the U.S. for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, published the news story revealing the "Dollar Account affair" that would bring down the government of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
  • Soviet Russian dissident Anatoly Shcharansky was arrested by the KGB on charges of espionage and treason connected to passing along information to the West concerning 1,300 people whose knowledge of Soviet state secrets kept them from being allowed to emigrate. Shcharansky would be spared the death penalty, but sentenced to 13 years at hard labor at Lefortovo Prison. In 1986, he would be released as part of a prisoner exchange and emigrate to Israel, where he would change his name to Natan Sharansky. He would later become a politician and an Israeli cabinet-level minister.
  • Soviet spy Sergei Fabiev was arrested as he was trying to leave France, where he had stolen the complete plans of the design of the Concorde aircraft. France's intelligence agency SDECE had decoded messages to Fabiev from Moscow that had congratulated him for obtaining the plans. Fabiev would be sentenced to 20 years in prison.
  • The government of Spain announced rules for the nation's first multiparty election in more than 40 years, to take place on June 15. Voting for the Congress of Deputies and the Senate in the Cortes Generales would have at least three deputies for each of Spain's 50 provinces, with additional deputies for every 144,500 residents above 289,000, and no incumbent deputy could run without resigning his or her seat.
  • The U.S. Senate voted, 66 to 26, to reinstate an embargo against importing chromium from the white-minority ruled African nation of Rhodesia, following a 250 to 146 vote the day before in the House of Representatives. The embargo had been suspended in 1971 because of the need in the U.S. for industry and national defense. President Carter signed the ban three days later.
  • Lobbied by singer and orange juice spokesperson Anita Bryant, the County Commission of Dade County, Florida, voted 6 to 3 to authorize a special referendum on whether to reverse a county ordinance that had been enacted in January against discrimination based on sexual orientation. Bryant, who had formed the group "Save Our Children Inc.", presented a petition of 64,000 signatures to demand the repeal of the ordinance. The vote was scheduled for June 7.
  • What is now in Yeonsung University in South Korea opened in the city of Anyang in Gyeonggi province, as the Anyang Industrial Technical School, becoming a technical college in 1979, and Anyang Science University in 2010 before adopting its present name in 2012.
  • The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a detailed regulation, 21 CFR §164.110. requiring that packages sold as "mixed nuts" must contain at least four different varieties of tree nuts or peanuts and that those with three or fewer varieties could only be called "mixes". A further regulation in 1993 would provide that the container volume must be at least 85% filled.
  • Born:
  • *Brian Tee, Japanese-born American TV actor known for portraying "Dr. Ethan Choi" on Chicago Med and its two spinoffs; in Okinawa
  • *Marcos Peña, Chief of the Cabinet of Ministers of Argentina for President Mauricio Macri, 2015-2019; in Buenos Aires
  • Died:
  • *Antonino Rocca, 55, Italian-born and Argentine-raised U.S. professional wrestler and celebrity, died of a urinary tract infection.
  • *Hubert Aquin, 47, Canadian novelist and screenwriter, shot himself to death.
  • *Austin M. Purves Jr., 76, American artist and sculptor

March 16, 1977 (Wednesday)

  • Kamal Jumblatt, the leader of Lebanon's leftist Progressive Socialist Party, was shot to death along with his bodyguard and his chauffeur by assassins between the Christian village of Deir Dourit and the Druze Muslim town of Baakleen. Jumblatt was on a mountain road southeast of Beirut when he was ambushed by at least three men armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles.
  • Voting began in India for the 542 seats of the lower house of parliament, the Lok Sabha.
  • Organized crime leader Santo Trafficante Jr. appeared before the special United States House Select Committee on Assassinations, and repeatedly refused to answer any questions directed at whether he had advance knowledge of plans for the 1963 assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy. Trafficante repeatedly invoked his right under the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to avoid self-incrimination.
  • Hans-Joachim Bohlmann of West Germany, already under treatment for mental illness, began a campaign of vandalism of the nation's artworks, five days after his wife had died in an accident. Bohlmann defaced a statue in the city park of Hamburg, then moved on to destroying paintings in museums, lasting until shortly before his death in 2009.
  • Died: Nina Demme, 74, Soviet Antarctic explorer and the first woman to lead a polar expedition

March 17, 1977 (Thursday)

March 18, 1977 (Friday)

  • Marien Ngouabi, the President of the People's Republic of the Congo since 1969, was shot to death in his office at Brazzaville by an assassination squad led by Congo Army Captain Barthelemy Kikadidi. The 11-member Military Committee of Ngouabi's Parti congolais du travail, headed by Army Colonel Joachim Yhombi-Opango, administered the nation until April 3, when Yhombi-Opango became the new President of the Congo. Former President Alphonse Massamba-Debat admitted, in custody of the police, that he had organized the failed coup d'etat against Ngouabi He was executed on March 25.
  • In Hanoi, the government of Vietnam met with a special commission sent by U.S. President Carter and released "12 black steel coffins" carrying the remains of 12 U.S. servicemen who had been killed in the Vietnam War. The five-member American group to take the bodies arranged for the coffins to be placed on a U.S. Air Force C-141 jet and then flew to Vientiane in Communist-ruled Laos to seek an accounting of servicemen missing in action.
  • The most popular Pakistani film up to that time, the romantic drama Aina, was released nationwide. Directed by Nazar-ul-Islam, the Urdu language movie starred actress Jharna Basak, better known as Shabnam, and actor Nadeem Baig in the roles of Rita and Iqbal, respectively.
  • The scheduled premiere in Munich of the Ulli Lommel film Adolf and Marlene was canceled after Marlene Dietrich threatened to file a lawsuit for defamation. Singer Dietrich, 75 years old at the time the suit was filed, had left Germany before Adolf Hitler came to power and was outraged by the film's premise that she had departed "to escape Hitler's unwanted attentions."
  • Born:
  • * Zdeno Chára, Slovak ice hockey player with 22 seasons and 1,680 games in the NHL between 1998 and 2022, and member of the Slovakian national team; in Trenčín, Czechoslovakia
  • * Arkady Babchenko, Russian journalist; in Moscow
  • * Willy Sagnol, French footballer with 58 caps for the France national team, later manager for the Georgia national team; in Saint-Étienne, Loire département
  • Died: Carlos Pace, 32, Brazilian race car driver, was killed in a plane crash during a storm, shortly after he and the pilot took off from São Paulo's Campo de Marte Airport in Mairiporã.

March 19, 1977 (Saturday)

  • An estimated 5,000 West German protesters against nuclear power, breaking away from a peaceful protest group in the state of Lower Saxony fought with 4,000 police near the city of Hamelin at Emmerthal, where construction of a power plant was underway on the Weser River. Over three hours, 20 police and an unknown number of demonstrators were injured after protesters knocked down fences and attempted an occupation.
  • The 168th and final episode was broadcast of the popular U.S. TV sitcom The Mary Tyler Moore Show, which completed seven seasons after making its debut on September 19, 1970.
  • The U.S. Department of State declined to renew its prohibition against allowing U.S. citizens to travel to the Communist nation of Cuba. Prohibitions against spending U.S. dollars in Cuba were lifted shortly afterward. The ban against business and tourist travel would be reinstated on April 19, 1982.
  • After receiving permission from the U.S. Army to explore mountains on the restricted White Sands Missile Range in the state of New Mexico, professional treasure hunter Norman Scott and his party of gold-seekers began 10 days of searching for "the Lost Treasure of Victorio Peak". The legend of the Lost Padre Mine dated back to the 1790s, when French Jesuit missionary Felipe La Rue reported a mine where gold was "stacked like cordwood". No gold was found in the 10-day search.
  • Born: Robert Lindstedt, Swedish tennis player, 2014 Australian Open doubles winner; in Stockholm
  • Died:
  • *William L. Laurence, 89, Lithuanian-born American science writer for The New York Times, Pulitzer Prize winner, and the only journalist present at the first test of an atomic bomb, died at his home in Majorca in Spain. The Associated Press noted that "Laurence was invited by U.S. authorities to witness the Alamogordo test... because they believed he was the reporter best capable of explaining the bomb to the world."
  • *Buck Shaw, 77, American college football player and college and pro football coach

March 20, 1977 (Sunday)

March 21, 1977 (Monday)

  • After having lost her seat in parliament in nationwide elections, and seeing the overwhelming defeat of her fellow Congress Party candidates, India's Prime Minister Indira Gandhi ended the state of emergency which she had implemented on June 25, 1975 to rule the nation. Mrs. Gandhi held an urgent meeting only hours after her loss was confirmed and the proclamation ending the emergency situation was signed by acting President B. D. Jatti just before dawn."
  • The Soviet Union's de facto leader, Soviet Communist Party General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev, said in a nationally-televised speech that U.S. President Carter needed to halt his human rights campaign if Soviet-American relations were to improve. "Washington's claim to teach others how to live cannot be accepted by any sovereign state... I repeat again: We will not tolerate interference in our internal affairs by anyone under any pretext."
  • Born: Mohammad Reza Golzar, popular Iranian singer and film actor; in Tehran
  • Died: Kinuyo Tanaka, 67, Japanese actress and film director, died of a brain tumor.

March 22, 1977 (Tuesday)

March 23, 1977 (Wednesday)

  • The government of British Prime Minister James Callaghan and his Labour Party government survived a Conservative motion for a vote of no confidence, with 298 against him and 322 in favor.
  • Former U.S. president Richard Nixon granted his first interviews since his 1974 resignation. With journalist David Frost conducting unlimited questioning, Nixon received payment of $600,000 and a 20% share of any profits. Nixon and Frost sat for 12 two-hour sessions on Wednesdays, Fridays and Mondays for four weeks at a seaside home in Monarch Beach, California. The edited sessions would be broadcast in four parts, starting on May 4, 1977.
  • By a 5 to 4 decision in the case of Brewer v. Williams, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the requirement of giving the Miranda Warning to all criminal suspects who have been placed under arrest and upheld the reversal of the murder conviction of Robert Anthony Williams, who had been found guilty of murdering a 10-year-old girl on Christmas Eve in 1968. The decision came after an appellate court concluded that the right to an attorney for Williams had been violated when police questioned him without his attorney present, and excluded all evidence from that had been presented following the location of the girl's body.
  • Born:
  • *Maxim Marinin, Russian figure skater and 2006 Olympic gold medalist and 2004 and 2005 world champion in pairs skating ; in Volgograd, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union
  • *Mehdi Safaei, Iranian kickboxer, karate athlete and bodybuilder; in Kermanshah
  • Died:
  • *Cardinal Emile Biayenda, 50, Roman Catholic Congolese cleric and Archbishop of Brazzaville, was kidnapped and murdered by three members of the family of the late President Marien Ngouabi.
  • *Rosy Barsony, 69, Hungarian-born stage and film dancer
  • *Joe Stydahar, 65, American pro football coach and college football player, enshrined at the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the College Football Hall of Fame.

March 24, 1977 (Thursday)

March 25, 1977 (Friday)

  • Pakistan's Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto ordered the arrest of almost all leaders of opposition political parties in the Asian nation, and about 25 officials of the nine-party Pakistan National Alliance were taken into custody in predawn raids. The imprisoned leaders would be held for almost two months.
  • Fugitives Robert Roth and Phoebe Hirsch became the first members of the U.S. domestic terrorist group Weather Underground, to surrender to police. Both had been among 13 members who had been indicted in 1970.
  • The final episode of the once-popular NBC TV situation comedy Sanford and Son was aired after six seasons and 136 episodes. Neither of the two stars of the show, Redd Foxx and Demond Wilson, were returning for a seventh season, with Foxx having signed a contract for a variety show on the ABC network, and producer Bud Yorkin refusing to agree to Wilson's demand to have his salary raised from $25,000 an episode to $35,000. As one critic noted after the final episode of the sixth season, The show attempted to continue with the supporting cast under the title Sanford Arms.
  • Born: Édgar Ramírez, Venezuelan film and TV actor; in San Cristóbal, Táchira

March 26, 1977 (Saturday)

March 27, 1977 (Sunday)

  • The collision of two Boeing 747 airliners killed 583 people at the airport in Tenerife on the Canary Islands, with most of the passengers and crew on a KLM jet and a Pan American World Airways jet perishing. Pan American Flight 1736 was taxiing toward runway 12. At 5:06 in the afternoon, KLM Flight 4805's pilot mistakenly believed that he had been cleared for takeoff and accelerated into the slower moving Pan Am airplane. The KLM crew took off in an attempt to avoid hitting the Pan Am jet, but the bottom of the KLM fuselage struck the top of the Pan Am fuselage. All 248 people on the KLM jet died. On the Pan Am jet, there were 61 survivors, but 335 of the 396 people on board were killed. Most of the people on Pan Am 1736 had been on their way to Las Palmas to board a cruise ship, the Golden Odyssey, for a Mediterranean cruise. The Transport Ministry of Spain would conclude 19 months later that the KLM pilot, Jacob van Zanten, who had more than 25 years of experience, had caused the accident by ignoring a "stand by for takeoff" order from the control tower and taking off without clearance.
  • Died: Diana Hyland, 41, American TV actress and one of the stars of Eight Is Enough, died of cancer 12 days after the show's premiere.

March 28, 1977 (Monday)

March 29, 1977 (Tuesday)

March 30, 1977 (Wednesday)

  • For the first time in more than 40 years, Spain granted workers the right to form their own trade unions. During the rule of Francisco Franco, government-operated trade unions mediated disputes between employees and manufacturers.
  • Died: Abdel Halim Hafez, 47, popular Egyptian singer and film actor nicknamed "The Dark-Skinned Nightingale", died from liver failure caused by 35 years of illness from the parasitic disease schistosomiasis.

March 31, 1977 (Thursday)

  • Hamaas Abdul Khaalis, who had been released on his own recognizance after the Hanfai Muslim seizure of 134 hostages in Washington D.C., as part of a deal, was sent to jail without bond after wiretap evidence revealed that he had threatened to kill 200 people.
  • In the Philippines, a veteran airline pilot left the controls of a DC-3 that he had been flying from Zamboanga City to Bongao in the Sulu Island, picked up an M-16 automatic rifle, killed seven people and wounded 14 others before he was subdued. Ernesto Abuloc told investigators that he was aware that the chartered flight's manifest included a bank manager who was carrying $95,000 in cash, and that his intent was to rob all 38 people aboard. Copilot Rolando Suarez subdued Abuloc when the gun misfired and Abuloc was trying to insert another clip of ammunition.
  • Police in Thailand arrested Tij Leka Mbret Shqptarvet, pretender to the throne of Albania as son of the late King Zog I, after finding a cache of assault rifles, rocket launchers and dynamite in his Bangkok hotel room. Booked on charges of illegal possession of deadly weapons, the 6'8" Albanian claimant, who told reporters "Call me King Leka I," and said that he lived in exile in Spain, said that he had started a guerrilla war to overthrow the Communist regime that had ruled Albania since the end of World War II. Leka explained "We are sending operational teams into Albania, on and off, in an out. I am the political head of the movement and, if you wish, the military commander. I am fighting to liberate my people. I'll continue to fight until we are free or I am dead. We are very stubborn people."
  • The U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Internal Security was abolished. During the era of McCarthyism in the 1950s, the Subcommittee, counterpart to the House Un-American Activities Committee, had investigated charges of Communist infiltration of the federal government. The HUAC and its successor, the House Internal Security Committee, had been abolished in 1975.
  • The Shadow Box, written by Michael Cristofer and winner of the Tony Award for Best Play, made its debut on Broadway at the Morosco Theatre and ran for 315 performances.