What happened in 1973? - USA
NASA (Crew of Skylab 4), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
We look at events, films and music from 1973 in the USA.
In the news
1973 was a momentous year in the US.
President Nixon was sworn in for a second term, but a scandal was about to engulf his presidency. News of a break-in at the Democratic National Committee Headquarters in the Watergate Complex in Washington DC hit the headlines in 1972, but Nixon's involvement in the break-in was unknown. The issue got more airtime in 1973. The first Senate televised hearings began in May and pressure on the Administration grew throughout the year.
In the same year, Nixon's Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned on charges of tax evasion; the US ended the draft for the Vietnam War; the US Supreme Court overturned state bans on abortions in the historic Roe v Wade ruling and engineer Martin Cooper made first hand-held cell-phone call.
1973 was also the year when the popularity of flared jeans with the young started to decline. They were still mainstream fashion.
- January 20 1973 - President Nixon and Vice President Agnew were sworn in for a second term in office.
- January 22 1973 - The US Supreme Court ruled that every US woman had the constitutional right to an abortion. The case, known as Roe v Wade, overturned state bans on abortions.
- January 22 1973 - The former US President, Lyndon Baines Johnson, died at his ranch in Texas.
- January 27 1973 - The US ended its military commitment to the Vietnam War.
- January 30 1973 - Former FBI agent, George Gordon Battle Liddy, was convicted and sentenced to 20 years in jail for his part in the Watergate burglary.
- March 29 1973 - The last US military forces left Vietnam.
- April 3 1973 - Martin Cooper of Motorola made the first cellular mobile phone call with a hand-held device. Cell phones were not available to consumers in the US for another ten years.
- April 4 1973 - The World Trade Center opened in New York. It was destroyed by terrorist attack on September 11 2001.
- May 3 1973 - The Sears Tower was opened in Chicago. It was then the world's tallest building.
- May 14 1973 - SkyLab, the United States' first space station, was launched by a Saturn V rocket.
- May 17 - Televised hearings on the Watergate break-ins started in the US Senate.
- September 20 - Billie Jean King defeated Bobby Riggs in a tennis match called 'The Battle of the Sexes'. Riggs was a former male tennis star and was aged 55 at the time. King was 29.
- October 10 - Vice President, Spiro Agnew resigned after pleading guilty to income tax evasion.
- October 20 - King Faisal of Saudi Arabia put in place an embargo on sales of oil to the United States. Other Arab states followed suit. It was in response to a generous $2.2m of military aid offered by Nixon to Israel. The embargo marked the end of cheap oil for the Western world.
- December 6 - Gerald Ford was sworn in as Vice President.
Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons: this image is a work of a United States Department of Justice employee, taken or made as part of that person's official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government (17 U.S.C. Section 101 and 105).
Facts
- The population of the USA was 212 million in 1973.
- President: Richard Milhous Nixon (Republican).
- Vice President: Spiro Agnew (Republican) until October 1973, Gerald Ford from December 1973
- Senate Majority Leader: Mike Mansfield of Montana (Democrat).
- House of Representatives Majority Leader: Tip O'Neill (Democrat).
- Median family income in 1973 was $12,051.
- Smoking: in 1973 Americans smoked 551 billion cigarettes. 3,500 for every adult at a cost of $12 billion [1].
- Automobiles: 55,800 people died and five million were injured in road accidents in 1973.
- 7.3 million US households subscribed to cable television channels in 1973 - 11% of the population. More than 96% had a television.
Source: Statistical Abstract of the United States 1974 or 1976, except where another reference is given
Films
AP Photo / Claudio Luffoli, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Horror with 'The Exorcist' was the top film of 1973. Nostalgia for the 1930s was popular with 'The Way We Were' and 'The Sting'. The US looked back to the more recent past in George Lucas' 'American Graffiti', which was about teenagers in Modesto, California in 1962.
The top twenty grossing films released in 1973 were:
- The Exorcist
- The Sting
- American Graffiti
- Papillion
- The Way We Were
- Magnum Force
- Robin Hood
- Last Tango in Paris
- Paper Moon
- Live and Let Die
- The Devil in Miss Jones
- Serpico
- Jesus Christ Superstar
- The World's Greatest Athlete
- Brother of the Wind
- Enter the Dragon
- Walking Tall
- The Day of the Jackal
- Sleeper
- A Touch of Class
Source: Box office report - retrieved from Wayback Machine
Television
All in the Family continued its run as the US' most popular TV show.
M*A*S*H was firmly established in the top ten by 1973. It was about the Korean War, not the Vietnam War as was commonly thought.
Two detective dramas were also in the top ten. Cannon, which starred William Conrad as private eye Frank Cannon, was replaced by a new series, Kojak, with Telly Savalas as NYPD's Lieutenant Theodopolis "Theo" Kojak. Kojak was to have a cult following with bubble gum cards and toys, including a scale model of Kojak's Buick car produced alongside the series.
The long-running western series Gunsmoke just sneaked into the top twenty for the last time. The series finished in 1975.
Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, a hip comedy sketch show from the 1960s, aired for the last time in 1973.
The other long-running series that captivated viewers in 1973 was the unfolding Watergate scandal.
The top-rated TV shows of the 1973 to 1974 season were:
- All in the Family
- The Waltons
- Sanford and Son
- M*A*S*H
- Hawaii Five-O
- Maude
- Kojak
- The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour
- Cannon
- The Six Million Dollar Man
- The Bob Newhart Show
- The Wonderful World of Disney
- The NBC Sunday Mystery Movie
- The Mary Tyler Moore Show
- Gunsmoke
- Happy Days
Source: US TV Nielsen Ratings 1973-1974
Music
The best-selling pop records of 1973 in the USA were:
- Killing Me Softly With His Song - Roberta Flack
- Tie A Yellow Ribbon Round The Ole Oak Tree - Dawn featuring Tony Orlando
- My Love - Paul McCartney and Wings
- You're So Vain - Carly Simon
- Crocodile Rock - Elton John
- Let's Get It On - Marvin Gaye
- Keep On Truckin' (Part 1) - Eddie Kendricks
- Midnight Train To Georgia - Gladys Knight and The Pips
- Bad, Bad Leroy Brown - Jim Croce
- Top Of The World - The Carpenters
Source: USA Top 1000 Singles compiled by Joe Whitburn, published by Guinness in 1986
Music facts
- Elvis Presley paid his ex-wife, Priscilla, $750,000 in their divorce settlement. Their only child, Lisa-Marie, sadly died, aged 54, in January 2023.
- "Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree" was written by Irwin Levine and L Russell Brown. It was recorded by Tony Orlando and his backing group, Dawn. The song tells the story of an ex-convict returning home from his time in prison, asking his love to tie a yellow ribbon around the "ole oak tree" if she still loved him and wanted him back. He is delighted on his return to find one hundred yellow ribbons tied around the "ole oak tree"! Tying yellow ribbons became synonymous with showing support for those away from home, be they fighting in a conflict, or being held hostage. Folk songs from the American Civil War period also refer to yellow ribbons, for example, "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon".
- Over the years, there has been much spectulation about whom the song "You're So Vain" was written about. Songwriter and singer, Carly Simon, has never completely confirmed who she was writing about, however, she has stongly hinted that it was the actor, Warren Beatty. Although David Bowie and Mick Jagger have also been suggested.
- The Rolling Stones performed at a benefit concert in aid of the earthquake victims of Managua, capital city of Nicaragua,as lead singer Mick Jagger's then wife, Bianca, was Nicaraguan. Over ten thousand people were killed and hundreds of thousand were left homeless by this 6.3 magnitude quake which had struck on 23 December 1972. The US rock band, Santana, also supported the concernt, as their percussionist, Chepito Areas was from Nicaragua.
Sport
Baseball: the Oakland Athletics beat the New York Mets to win the 1973 World Series.
American Football: the Miami Dolphins beat the Washington Redskins to win the seventh Super Bowl on January 14 1973.
Boxing: George Forman defeated Joe Frazier on January 22 1973 to claim both WBC and WBA World Heavyweight titles
Golf: Johnny Miller won the US Open in 1932.
Horse racing: Secretariat won the Triple Crown of the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes in 1973.
Fashion news
- Mary Quant introduced maxi skirts in the US. [2]
- Flared jeans were less popular on university campuses than in the previous year.
- Revlon launched the Charlie fragrance range for women.
- Baby blue or pink fluffy bed jackets are popular with women.
- Anti-Nixon T-shirts and posters were popular in the wake of Watergate.
'Year by Year in the Rock Era' by Herb Hendler, published by Greenwood Press, 1983
Products
- Sinclair launched the Cambridge pocket calculator for $55 fully built or $45 in kit form [3]
- Grundig launched the high-quality City Boy radio. It cost $20-55 [4]
References
[1]'The Guinness Book of Records 1974', published by Guinness Superlatives, page 260
[2] 'Year by Year in the Rock Era' by Herb Hendler, published by Greenwood Press, 1983, page 161
[3] 'Collectable Technology from retro to 21st Century gadgets' by Pepe Tozzo, published by Carlton books, 2005, page 20
More on 1973
See also
More on the 1970s
By Steven Braggs, January 2023
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