IT HAPPENED IN…1979

U.S. economic woes worsened, with interest rates, inflation, and the trade deficit growing, gasoline shortages, and the Consumer Price Index up 13.3%, the biggest jump in 33 years. 

The Federal Reserve tightened control of the money supply, inciting a financial panic.  Banks raised prime rates, bond prices fell, and stock prices dropped in the heaviest trading since 1929.  The markets recovered most of their losses within a week.   

A U.S. Surgeon General report labeled cigarette smoking “the single most important environmental factor contributing to early death.”

A partial meltdown released radioactive material at the Three Mile Island reactor in Pennsylvania, the worst nuclear accident in American history.

Congress authorized a $1.5 billion federal bailout for Chrysler Corporation.

Half of the 21,456 murders in the U.S. involved handguns. 

Newly introduced products and inventions included CompuServe Internet access, the Sony Walkman, and the Trivial Pursuit game.

1,968 U.S. soft drink bottling plants were in operation.