April 1972

April 1, 1972 (Saturday)

• For the first time in history, all scheduled National League and American League games were called off by a strike. The MLBPA's representatives voted 47–0 to call a walkout in a dispute over player pensions. The remaining four days of exhibitions were cancelled, and the April 5 season openers were postponed. The strike was resolved by April 15.
• New Zealand law created the Accident Compensation Corporation, which eliminated personal injury lawsuits in favor of an insurance system that compensates injured persons regardless of fault.

  April 2, 1972 (Sunday)

• Lt. Col. Iceal Hambleton, a USAF navigator with a background in ballistic missile technology and missile countermeasures, was the sole survivor of an EB-66 shot down behind enemy lines during the Easter Offensive of the Vietnam War. If he was captured, he would be a propaganda and intelligence bonanza for the North Vietnamese and the Soviet Union.
• RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta, the second radio station in the Republic of Ireland began broadcasting.
• Died:
• *Gil Hodges, 47, New York Mets manager since 1968
• *Franz Halder, 87, German general, the chief of the OKH General Staff 1938–1942

  April 3, 1972 (Monday)

• Silent film legend Charlie Chaplin returned to the United States after more than 20 years of self-imposed exile. "The Little Tramp" had been invited back for the Academy Awards.
• The museum exhibit "Arabia Felix Archaeology" opened at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History, curated by Gus Van Beek, Curator of Old World Anthropology.
• U.S. Congressman Les Aspin sued the Department of Defense in District Court to release the Peers Commission investigation report on the 1968 My Lai Massacre.
• Born: Jennie Garth, American actress ; in Urbana, Illinois
• Died:
• *Ferde Grofé, 80, American composer
• *Alvin Crowder, 73, American baseball pitcher and American League wins leader in 1932 and 1933

  April 4, 1972 (Tuesday)

• The United States formally recognized Bangladesh three months after the latter's creation.
• Died:
• *Adam Clayton Powell Jr., 63, first black U.S. representative from New York from 1945 to 1971)
• *Hodding Carter, 65, progressive U.S. journalist

  April 5, 1972 (Wednesday)

• A tornado killed six people in Vancouver, Washington, an area generally immune from twisters. Striking at, the storm injured 70 children at Vancouver's Ogden Elementary School, but none of them fatally.

  April 6, 1972 (Thursday)

• In response to the invasion of South Vietnam by troops from the north, more than 400 American airplanes bombed North Vietnam in the heaviest attacks there since 1968.

  April 7, 1972 (Friday)

• United Airlines Flight 855 was hijacked en route from Newark to Los Angeles, and diverted to San Francisco, where the 85 passengers were released in exchange for $500,000 ransom and parachutes. After the 727 returned to the air, the skyjacker, Richard McCoy Jr. then bailed out a few miles south of Provo, Utah, from. McCoy landed safely and hitchhiked home, and was not caught until two days later.
• The Federal Election Campaign Act went into effect, 60 days after it had been signed into law by President Nixon.
• WBC titleholder Bob Foster knocked out WBA champ Vicente Rondon with five seconds left in the second round of their match at Miami Beach, to become the undisputed light heavyweight boxing champion of the world.
• Communist forces overran the South Vietnamese town of Loc Ninh.
• Died:
• *Abeid Karume, 67, President of Zanzibar and Vice President of Tanzania, was assassinated by four men who invaded the Afro-Shirazi Party headquarters. Karume was succeeded by Zanzibar Vice President Aboud Jumbe.
• *Joey Gallo, 43, American mobster, was murdered while celebrating his birthday with a seafood dinner. Gallo and his family were at Umbertos Clam House on 132 Mulberry Street in New York City's Little Italy neighborhood.

  April 8, 1972 (Saturday)

• Kjell Isaksson of Sweden broke the world pole vault record held by Christos Papanikolaou, becoming the first person to vault higher than 5.5 meters. The mark was set at the Texas Relays in Austin, Texas.

  April 9, 1972 (Sunday)

• The Iraqi-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Co-operation was signed in Baghdad, for a term of 15 years, after which the USSR supplied increased military aid to Iraq, as part of an agreement "to develop their cooperation in the matter of strengthening their defence capacity".

  April 10, 1972 (Monday)

• United States President Richard Nixon and Soviet head of state Nikolai Podgorny signed the Biological Weapons Convention, in their respective capitals of Washington and Moscow. Representatives from 74 other nations signed the treaty at the Washington ceremony.
• At 5:36 in the morning local time, the 6.7 Qir earthquake shook southern Iran with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX, killing thousands of people in the province of Fars. The final death toll was listed as 5,374. The majority of the deaths were in the town of Qir, where two thirds of its residents were killed.
• The body of Oberdan Sallustro, the general manager of FIAT operations in Argentina, was found near Buenos Aires, 20 days after he had been kidnapped by the People's Revolutionary Army. On the same day, the terrorist organization assassinated General Juan Carlos Sanchez as he was being driven to his office in Rosario.
• Fifteen mountain climbers were killed by an avalanche while attempting to climb Manaslu, the world's eighth tallest mountain. The South Korean financed expedition consisted of four Koreans, a Japanese cameraman, and their ten Nepalese Sherpa guides.
• The city of Fujimi was founded in Japan.
• Born: Gordon Buchanan, Scottish wildlife filmmaker; in Dumbarton, West Dunbartonshire

  April 11, 1972 (Tuesday)

• For the first time, the deliberations of the United States bishops of the Roman Catholic Church were opened to the press. Seventy-five reporters were invited to the meeting, held in Atlanta. Cardinal John Krol then delivered his speech in Latin. Cardinal Krol told reporters, "We told you we'd let you in. We didn't tell you what language we'd talk."
• Born: Jason Varitek, MLB catcher, 1994 winner of the Dick Howser Trophy for best player in college baseball; in Rochester, Michigan
• Died: George H. Plympton, 82, American screenwriter

  April 12, 1972 (Wednesday)

• The table tennis team from the People's Republic of China arrived in Detroit to begin their tour of the United States. An American team had been welcomed to China one year earlier, on April 10, 1971.
• Born: Marco Goecke, German choreographer; in Wuppertal, West Germany.

  April 13, 1972 (Thursday)

• The United States Senate voted 68–16 to approve the War Powers Act, which would limit the power of the President to commit American forces to hostilities without Congressional approval. The legislation then moved on to the House.
• The first destruction of an enemy tank by Cobra attack helicopter was made by CW2 Barry McIntyre, in the course of the Battle of An Loc. The maneuverable and destructive Cobras were able to stop entire columns of North Vietnamese tanks, and turned the course of the Easter Offensive.
• Lt. Col. Iceal Hambleton, a USAF EB-66 navigator who had been shot down on April 2, was rescued. He had spent 11½ days behind enemy lines. During the rescue operation, five aircraft were shot down, eleven U.S. servicemen were killed, and two men were captured. The rescue operation was the "largest, longest, and most complex search-and-rescue" operation during the entire Vietnam War.
• The television show My Three Sons broadcast its 380th, and final, original episode. The last prime-time rerun was on August 24, 1972.
• Frontier Airlines Flight 91, a Boeing 737-200, was Hijacked by Chicano Activist Ricardo Chavez Ortiz shortly after takeoff from Albuquerque, New Mexico and was forced to land in Los Angeles.

  April 14, 1972 (Friday)

• On what would become known as "Bloody Friday", the IRA set off a wave of bombs in Belfast, starting with 14 explosions in commemoration of the 14 dead during the "Bloody Sunday Massacre". At least twenty bombs exploded in the space of eighty minutes, most within a half hour period. Nine people were killed.
• The Grateful Dead played their first paying concert, in front of a foreign language crowd, in Copenhagen, Denmark at the Tivolis Koncertsa.

  April 15, 1972 (Saturday)

• The Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement was signed in Ottawa by President Nixon of the United States and Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada.
• After a ten-day strike postponement, the 1972 Major League Baseball season opened, including the Detroit Tigers' 3–2 win over the Boston Red Sox. Cancellations were not rescheduled, and teams played an uneven number games, an imbalance that allowed Detroit Tigers to clinch the AL East pennant a game ahead of Boston.
• A "state of internal war" was declared in Uruguay by vote of the General Assembly, the day after the Tupamaros renewed their attacks on government officials. The legislature voted to give President Bordaberry emergency powers, and the Uruguayan military began its rule of the South American nation.
• Born: Arturo Gatti, Canadian boxer, IBF lightweight boxer 1995-1998, and WBC super lightweight champion 2004-2005; in Montreal
• Died: Joe McCann, 24, Irish Republican Army paramilitary officer, suspected in the attempted assassination of the Northern Ireland Minister for Home Affairs, John Taylor, was shot to death by members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary who were later charged with, but acquitted of murder.

  April 16, 1972 (Sunday)

• Ling-Ling and Hsing-Hsing, the first giant pandas in the United States, arrived at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., as a gift from the People's Republic of China. The two pandas attracted millions of visitors during their lifetimes. Ling-Ling lived until 1992 and her mate survived until 1999.
• For the first time since the Vietnam War had started, Haiphong, the largest port in North Vietnam, was bombed by American forces. The wave of B-52 runs began at dawn in retaliation for the North's invasion of South Vietnam.
• Jane Blalock won the inaugural Dinah Shore Colgate Winner's Circle in Rancho Mirage, California. The Dinah Shore would become one of the LPGA Tour's major golf championships in 1983.
• Apollo 16 was launched at EST.
• Born: Conchita Martínez, Spanish tennis player who won the Wimbledon women's singles title in 1994; in Barcelona
• Died: Yasunari Kawabata, 72, Japanese writer, 1968 Nobel Prize in Literature winner, committed suicide