July 1968

The following events occurred in July 1968:

July 1, 1968 (Monday)

• Seaboard World Airlines Flight 253A, a Douglas DC-8 chartered by the US armed forces and carrying 214 American soldiers heading for South Vietnam, is intercepted in Soviet airspace by MiG-17 fighters who force it to land at Burevestnik, an airfield in the Kurile Islands, where the flight is detained for two days.^[1]
• A Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation carrying medical supplies to Biafra on behalf of the International Red Cross crashes close to the airstrip at Uli, Anambra, Nigeria, in bad weather. One of the four people on board is killed.^[2]
• The United States Central Intelligence Agency launches its Phoenix Program, intended to identify and "neutralize" the infrastructure of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam (the "Viet Cong").^[3]
• The international Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons is opened for signature.
• In the United States, the Chicago Great Western Railway is merged with the Chicago Great Western Railway.^[4]
• Japan's new postal code system is launched at Tokyo's Central Post Office.^[5]

July 2, 1968 (Tuesday)

• Student protests break out in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.^[6]
• The 18th Berlin International Film Festival comes to an end, with the Golden Bear (first prize) being awarded to the Swedish film Ole dole doff, directed by Jan Troell.^[7]

July 3, 1968 (Wednesday)

• Six people, and eight racehorses belonging to William Hill, are killed when a BKS Air Transport Airspeed Ambassador arriving from Deauville in France crashes at London Heathrow Airport, UK. The aircraft hits two empty BEA airliners. The crash is attributed to metal fatigue.^[8]

July 4, 1968 (Thursday)

• British yachtsman Alec Rose arrives in Portsmouth, UK, at the end of his 354-day circumnavigation of the globe.^[9][10]

July 5, 1968 (Friday)

• Alec Rose is knighted by Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom in recognition of his achievement in sailing around the world single-handed.^[11]
• In the final of the Wimbledon Ladies' Singles tennis competition, American Billie-Jean King defeats Australian Judy Tegart 9–7, 7–5, to take her third title.

July 6, 1968 (Saturday)

• In the final of the Wimbledon Men's Singles tennis competition, Rod Laver defeats fellow Australian Tony Roche. Laver collects £2000 in prize money, compared to the £750 awarded to the women's singles champion.^[12][13]

July 7, 1968 (Sunday)

• British R&B group The Yardbirds, play their final concert, at Luton College of Technology in Bedfordshire.^[14][15]

July 8, 1968 (Monday)

• A Convair CV-340 belonging to Saudi Arabian Airlines crashes after aborting its third approach at Dhahran International Airport in Saudi Arabia because of visibility problems created by dust; all 11 people on board are killed.^[16]
• Born: Billy Crudup, US actor, in Manhasset, New York

July 9, 1968 (Tuesday)

July 10, 1968 (Wednesday)

• Maurice Couve de Murville is elected to succeed Georges Pompidou as Prime Minister of France.

July 11, 1968 (Thursday)

July 12, 1968 (Friday)

July 13, 1968 (Saturday)

• A Boeing 707 cargo plane of the Belgian airline Sabena hits trees and crashes on approach to Lagos Airport, Nigeria; all seven people on board are killed.^[17]
• The 1968 Open Championship golf tournament is held at Carnoustie Golf Links, Scotland, and is won by South Africa's Gary Player.^[18]
• The 17th Miss Universe beauty pageant is held in Miami, Florida, USA, and is won by Martha Vasconcellos of Brazil.^[19]

July 14, 1968 (Sunday)

• The 1968 Northern 300 NASCAR motor race is held at Trenton Speedway and is won by LeeRoy Yarbrough.^[20]

July 15, 1968 (Monday)

July 16, 1968 (Tuesday)

• Born: Dhanraj Pillay, Indian field hockey player, in Khadki

July 17, 1968 (Wednesday)

• The 17 July Revolution takes place in Iraq. Saddam Hussein is appointed Vice Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council. His co-revolutionary Salah Omar Al-Ali is also appointed to the council.

July 18, 1968 (Thursday)

• The semiconductor manufacturing company Intel is founded by Gordon E. Moore and Robert Noyce in Mountain View, California, USA, the company's name being derived from a combination of the words integrated and electronics and is a pun on "intelligence".^[21]
• Died: Corneille Heymans, 76, Belgian physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate

July 19, 1968 (Friday)

• The Filipino cargo ship SS Magsaysay catches fire in the South China Sea off South Korea and is abandoned. The ship is towed into Busan but is subsequently scrapped.

July 20, 1968 (Saturday)

July 21, 1968 (Sunday)

• An Aeroflot Antonov An-2, having strayed 10 km (6.2 miles) off course, crashes into a 4000-meter mountain near Sufi-Kurgan in the Kirghiz Soviet Socialist Republic; all 14 people on board are killed.^[22]
• The 1968 Tour de France ends in Paris, with Jan Janssen of the Netherlands emerging as overall winner.
• The 1968 PGA Championship, held at Pecan Valley Golf Club in San Antonio, Texas, USA, is won by American golfer Julius Boros.^[23]

July 22, 1968 (Monday)

July 23, 1968 (Tuesday)

• El Al Flight 426 hijacking: In the first hijacking incident attributed to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, when a Boeing 707, en route from London Heathrow Airport to Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport but ultimately destined for and then to Lod Airport in Israel, is diverted to Algiers.^[24][25]
• Glenville shootout: Police in the Glenville district of Cleveland, Ohio, USA, exchange fire with the "Black Nationalists of New Libya", a Black Power group. By the end of the incident the following morning, three policemen, three suspects and a bystander have been killed and 15 others injured.^[26]

July 24, 1968 (Wednesday)

• The Palestinian hijackers holding El Al Flight 426 release the 26 non-Israeli passengers who were on board the plane.

July 25, 1968 (Thursday)

• Humanae vitae, a papal encyclical subtitled On the Regulation of Birth, is issued by Pope Paul VI, reaffirming the position of the Roman Catholic Church on birth control, effectively prohibiting all forms of contraception.^[27]

July 26, 1968 (Friday)

July 27, 1968 (Saturday)

• Born: Jorge Salinas, Mexican TV actor, in Zacatecas

July 28, 1968 (Sunday)

• A United States Air Force C-124C Globemaster II crashes into mountain while descending into Recife/Guararapes International Airport in Brazil; all 10 people on board are killed.^[28]
• Died: Otto Hahn, 89, German chemist, discoverer of nuclear fission, Nobel Prize laureate^[29]
• England's Court of Appeal upholds an appeal against a judgement of the previous year which had found Hubert Selby, Jr.'s novel Last Exit to Brooklyn to contravene Section 3 of the Obscene Publications Act. Writer John Mortimer, QC, appears for the defence.^[30][31]

July 29, 1968 (Monday)

• Arenal Volcano, in Costa Rica, erupts violently, resulting in 87 human deaths and those of many animals, over a period of several days.^[32]

July 30, 1968 (Tuesday)

• A U.S. Air Force Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker on a training exercise crashes when its vertical stabilizer separates from the aircraftover a forest on Mount Lassen, near Red Bluff, California; all nine people on board are killed.^[33]
• Thames Television broadcasts for the first time, to London and the surrounding area of the UK. The company would continue to hold the independent television franchise for this area until 1992.^[34]
• Only three passengers board the final passenger train to operate on the Grand Canyon Railway, a subsidiary of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway.^[35]
• Died: Jón Leifs, 69, Icelandic composer, pianist, and conductor

July 31, 1968 (Wednesday)

• Died: Jack Pizzey, 57, Premier of Queensland, Australia (heart attack)^[36]

References