Events That Happened in 1972

1972 Events

1972 Atari Releases Pong Arcade
Pong (marketed as PONG) is one of the earliest arcade video games, and is a tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics. The aim is to defeat an opponent—either computer-...
1972 Ford Courier is First Produced
The Ford Courier is a compact pickup truck which was sold in the United States and Canada from 1972 to 1982 and elsewhere to the present day. It is considered to be the forerunner of the ...
1972 Funkadelic releases America Eats Its Young
America Eats Its Young is the fourth album (a double album) by Funkadelic, released in 1972. This was the first album to include the whole of the House Guests, including Bootsy Collins, C...
1972 Georgia, Georgia first script by an African American woman to be filmed
A trailblazer in film and television, Dr. Angelou wrote the screenplay and composed the score for the 1972 film Georgia, Georgia. Her script, the first by an African American woman ever t...
1972 Maya Angelou receives Pulitzer Prize Nomination
Poems of love and regret, of racial strife and confrontation, songs of people and songs of the heart - all are charged with Maya Angelou's zest for life and her rage at injustice. Lyrical...
1972 Michael Jackson's first solo hit “Ben” reaches No. 1
"Ben" is a number-one hit song recorded by the teenaged Michael Jackson for the Motown label in 1972. The song, the theme of a 1972 film of the same name, spent one week at the top of the...
1972 "Pay Day" Is Released
Payday is a film released in 1972 written by Don Carpenter and directed by Daryl Duke. It stars Rip Torn as a country music singer. Other members of the cast include Ahna Capri, Elayne He...
1972 The Magnavox Odyssey, First Video Game Console
The Magnavox Odyssey is the world's first home video game console. It was first demonstrated in May, 24th, 1972 and released that fall, predating the Atari Pong home consoles by three yea...
1972 Jan Blue Öyster Cult releases their self-titled debut album
Blue Öyster Cult is the eponymous debut album by hard rock band Blue Öyster Cult, released in January 1972 (see 1972 in music). The album featured songs such as "Cities on Flame with Rock...
1972 Jan 13 A Clockwork Orange is Released
A Clockwork Orange is a 1971 satirical science fiction film adaptation of Anthony Burgess's 1962 novel A Clockwork Orange. The film concerns Alex DeLarge (Malcolm McDowell), a charismatic...
1972 Jan 16 Super Bowl VI - Cowboys 24, Dolphins 3
Super Bowl VI was an American football game played on January 16, 1972, at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans, Louisiana to decide the National Football League (NFL) champion following the 197...
1972 Jan 24 Aretha Franklin Releases "Young, Gifted and Black"
Young, Gifted and Black is a soul album by Aretha Franklin, released in 1972. It takes its title from the Nina Simone song "To Be Young, Gifted and Black", which is included on the album....
1972 Jan 26 JAT Yugoslav Airlines Flight 367 is Bombed
The plane crashed after the detonation of a bomb in the forward cargo hold. A flight attendant, 22 year old Vesna Vulovic, fell 33,330 feet in the tail section and although she broke both...
1972 Feb Scorpions release their first album Lonesome Crow
Lonesome Crow is the first album by the German heavy metal band Scorpions produced by Conny Plank and released in 1972. It is the band's only album with lead guitarist Michael Schenker...
1972 Feb 3
to 1972 Feb 13
 XI Olympic Winter Games Held in Sapporo, Japan
The 1972 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XI Olympic Winter Games, were a winter multi-sport event which was celebrated from February 3 to February 13, 1972 in Sapporo, Japan. It ...
1972 Feb 7 Boston University defeats Boston College, 4-2
1972 Feb 7 Harvard defeats Northeastern, 8-3
1972 Feb 13 "Cabaret" Is Released
Cabaret is a 1972 American musical film directed by Bob Fosse and starring Liza Minnelli, Michael York and Joel Grey. The film is set in Berlin during the Weimar Republic in 1931, under t...
1972 Feb 14 Boston College defeats Northeastern, 5-4
1972 Feb 14 Boston University defeats Harvard, 4-1
1972 Feb 18 The Rolling Stones Release 'Milestones'
Here we have Volume 24 of the Russian boots. It is nothing more than a contract compilation. I must say, I really like this particular compilation. It reached #14 on the U.K. charts. All ...
1972 Feb 19 "The Goalkeeper's Fear Of The Penalty" Is Released
The Goalkeeper's Fear of the Penalty (German: Die Angst des Tormanns beim Elfmeter; also known as The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick) is a 1972 German language drama film directed b...
1972 Feb 20 Elvis Presley releases Elvis Now
Elvis Now is a gold-selling Elvis Presley album from 1972. Despite the "now" in the title, the tracks on this album were recorded anywhere from one to three years before its release. "...
1972 Feb 21 Richard Nixon Arrives In China For An Official Visit
On February 21, 1972, Richard M. Nixon arrived in China for an eight-day official visit. He was the first U.S. president to visit the People's Republic of China since its inception in 19...
1972 Feb 26 Buffalo Creek Flood
The disaster killed 125 people, injured 1,000, and left 4,000 homeless. Five hundred and seven houses were lost or demolished 44 mobile homes were destroyed another 273 houses were severe...
1972 Mar 1 Deep Purple release Machine Head
Machine Head is the sixth studio album released by English rock band Deep Purple. It was recorded through December 1971 in Montreux, Switzerland, and released in March 1972. Machine He...
1972 Mar 3 Stevie Wonder Releases Music of My Mind
Music of My Mind is a landmark album by Stevie Wonder, released on March 3, 1972 (see 1972 in music). It was the first of five consecutive albums widely hailed as his "classic period", al...
1972 Mar 10
to 1972 Mar 12
 The National Black Political Convention is Held in Gary, Indiana
Some eight thousand African Americans (three thousand of whom were official delegates) arrived in Gary, Indiana, to attend their first convention, which was more commonly known as the "Ga...
1972 Mar 14 Linda Jones Dies
Linda Jones (14 December 1944, Newark, New Jersey - 14 March 1972, Harlem) was an American soul singer. She started in her family's gospel group the Jones Singers at the age of six. Her f...
1972 Mar 15 "The Godfather" Is Released
The Godfather is a 1972 American thriller film based on the 1969 novel of the same name by Mario Puzo and directed by Francis Ford Coppola from a screenplay by Puzo, Coppola, and Robert T...
1972 Mar 25 UCLA Beats Florida State in Final Four
The 1972 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament involved 25 schools playing in single-elimination play to determine the national champion of men's NCAA University Division (the prede...
1972 Mar 26 "Just Another Band from L.A." by The Mothers Is Released
Just Another Band from L.A. is a live album by The Mothers, released in 1972 (see 1972 in music). It was recorded live in Pauley Pavilion on the campus of UCLA. A full version was later r...
1972 Mar 28 J. R. R. Tolkien Is Appointed A Commander Of The Order Of The British Empire By Queen Elizabeth II
Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford from 1925 to 1945, and Merton Professor of English Language and Literature from 1945 to 1959. He was a close friend o...
1972 Mar 30 Easter Offensive, Officially Known as the Nguyen Hue Offensive, Begins
The Easter Offensive, officially, the Nguyen Hue Offensive and also (Chiến dịch Xuân hè 1972 in Vietnamese) was a military campaign conducted by the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN, the re...
1972 Mar 30 First Battle of Quang Tri Begins
The First Battle of Quảng Trị resulted in the first major victory for the North Vietnamese Army during the Nguyen Hue Offensive of 1972. The province of Quảng Trị was a major battle gr...
1972 Apr Elvis Presley releases He Touched Me
He Touched Me was a 1972 gospel music album by Elvis Presley which sold over 1 million copies in the US alone and earned Presley his second of three Grammy Awards. Not counting compilatio...
1972 Apr 4
to 1972 Apr 7
 Battle of Loc Ninh
The Battle of Loc Ninh was a major battle fought during the North Vietnamese Easter Offensive and lasted from 4–7 April 1972. Loc Ninh was a small district town in Binh Long Province, app...
1972 Apr 6
to 1972 Apr 9
 Jack Nicklaus wins the 36th Masters Tournament
Jack Nicklaus joined Arnold Palmer as the Masters only four-time winner scoring 286 over 72 holes. Nicklaus's score was the only sub-par four-day total, and he became the Tournament's thi...
1972 Apr 10 44th Academy Awards
The 44th Academy Awards were presented April 10, 1972 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles. The ceremonies were presided over by Helen Hayes, Alan King, Sammy Davis, Jr., and Jac...
1972 Apr 13
to 1972 Jul 20
 Battle of An Loc
The initial wave of the offensive was followed on 5 April by a PAVN advance out of Cambodia into Binh Long Province, northeast of Saigon. Its targets were the towns and airfields at Loc N...
1972 Apr 15 Arturo Gatti Is Born
Arturo "Thunder" Gatti (April 15, 1972 – July 11, 2009) was a Canadian and Italian professional boxer. Born in Calabria, Italy and raised in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, Gatti relocated to J...
1972 Apr 16
11:54AM
to 1972 Apr 27
1:45PM
 Apollo 16 Mission
Apollo 16 was the tenth manned mission in the Apollo program, the fifth mission to land on the Moon and the first to land in a highlands area. The mission was launched on April 16, 1972, ...
1972 Apr 20 Stephen Marley is born
Stephen Robert Nesta "Raggamuffin" Marley (born April 20, 1972 in Wilmington, Delaware) is a Jamaican American musician and the son of reggae legend Bob Marley and his wife Rita Marley. ...
1972 May 2
to 1972 Jul 1
 Battle of Kontum
The objective PAVN forces during the third phase of the Nguyen Hue Offensive was to seize the cities of Kontum and Pleiku, thereby overrunning the Central Highlands. This would then open ...
1972 May 2 Sunshine Mine Fire
A fire of as yet undetermined origin was detected by Sunshine employees at approximately 11:35 a.m. on May 2, 1972. At that time, smoke and gas was coming from the 910 raise on the 3700 ...
1972 May 9
to 1972 Oct 23
 Operation Linebacker
Operation Linebacker was the title of a U.S. Seventh Air Force and U.S. Navy Task Force 77 aerial interdiction campaign conducted against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam...
1972 May 11 Boston Bruins win Stanley Cup
The 1972 Stanley Cup Final NHL championship series was contested by the Boston Bruins and the New York Rangers. It was the Rangers first appearance in the championship final series since ...
1972 May 12 The Rolling Stones Release 'Exile on Main St.'
Exile on Main St. is the tenth studio album by English rock band The Rolling Stones. It was released as a double LP in 1972 and drew on influences from rock & roll, blues, country and sou...
1972 May 13 Thanh Hoa Bridge is Destroyed by A-7 Corsair Bombings
The Thanh Hoa Bridge, spanning the Song Ma river, is situated 3 miles (4.8 km) north east of Thanh Hóa, the capital of Thanh Hoa Province in Vietnam. The Vietnamese gave it the nickname H...
1972 May 19 Rohan Marley is born
Rohan Anthony Marley (born 1972) is the son of late reggae artist Bob Marley and Janet Hunt. He is a member of the Rastafari movement. Marley and musician Lauryn Hill met in 1996. Hill...