What happened onMay 3, 1974Friday Week 18

Today is September11, 2026 Friday.

May 3 is a Friday again in 1985.

About May 3

May 3 Events On this day through the years

Born ?

May 3FamousBirthdays

In loving memoryFamous DeathsMay 3

The World in 1974 the year we met Lucy

Fossil hunters in Ethiopia dug Lucy out of a dry gully in November, after she had lain there for about 3.2 million years. If you counted off one of those years every second, you would be counting for five weeks straight without sleeping.

Life back then

Gas stations opened with lines around the block and shut when the pumps ran dry. Many American states let drivers fill up only on odd or even days, depending on the last digit of the license plate. Thermostats went down and sweaters came out. A craze for streaking ran through colleges, sports grounds and even the Oscars broadcast. Pocket calculators finally got cheap enough for students to carry, and slide rules started vanishing from shirt pockets.

The year in 8 events

• 💡Jan 1 British factories start working a three day week to save electricity. Homes get power cuts too.
• 🏺Mar 29 Farmers digging a well in Shaanxi, China, hit a clay head. It is the first piece of the Terracotta Army.
• 🎤Apr 6 ABBA wins the Eurovision Song Contest in Brighton with Waterloo.
• ⚾Apr 8 Hank Aaron hits his 715th home run in Atlanta and passes Babe Ruth's record.
• 🌹Apr 25 Portuguese soldiers overthrow their government almost without a shot. People put carnations in the rifle barrels.
• 🚶Aug 7 Philippe Petit walks a wire strung between the twin towers of the World Trade Center.
• 🏛️Aug 9 Richard Nixon resigns as US president over Watergate. Gerald Ford is sworn in the same day.
• 🥊Oct 30 Muhammad Ali knocks out George Foreman in Kinshasa and wins back the heavyweight title.

Who Was in Charge?

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