1974 was a year of firsts. Richard Nixon, enmeshed in the Watergate scandal, became the first American president to resign from office. Hank Aaron became the first baseball player to top Babe Ruth’s career home run record. Scientists in Ethiopia found the first skeleton of a 3-million-year-old human ancestor that walked upright, while archaeologists in China unearthed an army of more than 8,000 lifesize terracotta warriors. In America, disco fever raged, and Archie Bunker broke TV sitcom ground with his blunt and bigoted take on hot-button social issues.
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On February 1, 1974, University of Washington student Lynda Ann Healy disappears from her apartment and is killed by Ted Bundy. The murder marked Bundy’s entry into the ranks of serial killers as he had recently attacked his first victim, Sharon Clarke, in her Seattle home. By the time he was finally captured on February 15, 1978, Bundy had become America’s most famous serial killer.
Serial Murderer Theodore “Ted” Bundy walks forward and waves to TV camera as his indictment for the January murders of Lisa Levy and Margaret Bowman is read at the Leon County Jail. (Credit: Bettmann/Getty Images)
Bettmann/Getty Images
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On February 4, 1974, Patty Hearst, the 19-year-old granddaughter of newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst, is kidnapped from her apartment in Berkeley, California, by three armed strangers. Her fiancee, Steven Weed, was beaten and tied up along with a neighbor who tried to help. Witnesses reported seeing a struggling Hearst being carried away blindfolded, and she was put in the trunk of a car. Neighbors who came out into the street were forced to take cover after the kidnappers fired their guns to cover their escape.
SAN FRANCISCO - SEPTEMBER 19: Heiress Patty Hearst poses for a San Mateo Sheriff mugshot after her arrest for bank robbery on September 19, 1975 in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Donaldson Collection/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
Getty Images
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On February 26, 1974, Nike receives a U.S. patent for its waffle trainer running shoes. Nike co-founder Bill Bowerman invented the now-iconic soles in a waffle iron over breakfast.
ITHACA, NY – CIRCA 1974: A general view of a Nike Waffle trainer running shoe on a rock circa 1974 at a gorge in Ithaca, NY. (Photo by Amy Abramson/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
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On March 29, 1974, prominent Soviet author, historian and political dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is reunited with his family after being exiled from his home country. Publication of The Gulag Archipelago, his detailed history of the Soviet Union's vast system of prisons and labor camps, helped raise global awareness of the communist nation's rampant political repression. Its publication led Soviet authorities to arrest him for treason, strip him of his citizenship and physically expel him from the U.S.S.R. in February 1974.
Soviet dissident Alexandre Soljenitsyn greets his sons Ignat Soljenitsyn,18 months and Yermolai Soljenitsyn, (3 years) as they arrive in Zurich. 29 March 1974. (Photo by James Andanson/Sygma via Getty Images)
James Andanson
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On April 8, 1974, Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves hits his 715th career home run, breaking Babe Ruth’s legendary record of 714 homers. A crowd of 53,775 people, the largest in the history of Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium, was with Aaron that night to cheer when he hit a 4th inning pitch off the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Al Downing. However, as Aaron was an African American who had received death threats and racist hate mail during his pursuit of one of baseball’s most distinguished records, the achievement was bittersweet.
ATLANTA, GEORGIA, - APRIL 8, 1974: Hank Aaron hits his 715th home run, breaking Babe Ruth's long-standing record of 714 lifetime home runs. Even now, as Hank Aaron goes on establishing an even higher total, there is probably a Little Leaguer out there somewhere who will, in the future, rewrite the record book again. (Photo by Sporting News via Getty Images via Getty Images)
Sporting News via Getty Images
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On July 27, 1974, the House Judiciary Committee recommends that America’s 37th president, Richard M. Nixon, be impeached and removed from office. The impeachment proceedings resulted from a series of political scandals involving the Nixon administration that came to be collectively known as Watergate.
The House Judiciary Committee begins its debate on the possible impeachment of President Nixon in Washington on July 24th, 1974. (Photo by UPI/Bettmann Archive/Getty Images)
Getty Images
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High above the early-morning traffic in Lower Manhattan, a French street performer steps off the roof of the south tower of the World Trade Center on August 7, 1974. Clad in black and carrying a long pole for balance, Philippe Petit begins the most famous high-wire walk in history, calmly traversing the space between the Twin Towers at a height of 1,350 feet.
Philippe Petit crossing the Twin Towers on a tightrope.
AP Photo/Alan Welner
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In accordance with his statement of resignation the previous evening, Richard M. Nixon officially ends his term as the 37th president of the United States at noon on August 9, 1974. Before departing with his family in a helicopter from the White House lawn, he smiled farewell and enigmatically raised his arms in a victory or peace salute. The helicopter door was then closed, and the Nixon family began their journey home to San Clemente, California. Richard Nixon was the first U.S. president to resign from office.
Gerald R. Ford, Head and Shoulder Portrait speaking to Press shortly after becoming U.S. President upon Richard Nixon's Resignation, Washington, D.C., USA, photographer Thomas J. O'Halloran, Warren K. Leffler, August 9, 1974. (Photo by: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
Universal History Archive/Univer
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