1972 History, Facts, and Trivia

In 1972, Richard Nixon went to China, signed an arms control treaty with the Soviets, won re-election in a landslide, and authorized a break-in at a Washington office complex that would eventually end his presidency. The Godfather arrived in theaters. Atari was founded with $250. HBO launched. ABBA came together in Sweden. Eleven Israeli athletes were murdered at the Munich Olympics. The US Men’s Basketball team lost its first Olympic game and refused the silver medals in protest. It was a year that moved on multiple tracks simultaneously, and most of them led somewhere consequential.

Quick Facts from 1972

• World-Changing Event: Intel released the 8008, the first 8-bit microprocessor, in April 1972, beginning the chain of development that led to the personal computer; the Watergate break-in occurred on June 17, setting in motion the events that ended a presidency
• Top Song: The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face by Roberta Flack, the best-performing single of the year on the Billboard Year-End Hot 100
• Must-See Movies: The Godfather, The Poseidon Adventure, What’s Up, Doc?, Deliverance, Cabaret, and The Getaway
• Most Famous Person in America: President Richard Nixon, who visited China, signed arms control treaties, won re-election by 18 million votes, and authorized the Watergate break-in within the same calendar year
• Notable Books: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach and Watership Down by Richard Adams
• Price of Peter Max Sneakers: $4.44
• Price of Q-Tips, 125-count: 87 cents
• US Life Expectancy: Males: 67.4 years / Females: 75.1 years
• The Funny Guy: George Carlin, who was arrested in Milwaukee for performing his Seven Dirty Words bit in public; also Martin Mull, Don Rickles, and Lily Tomlin
• Chinese Zodiac: Year of the Rat, associated with intelligence, adaptability, and resourcefulness — qualities that were applied to varying ends in 1972
• Doomsday Clock: 12 minutes to midnight, the furthest from midnight it had been set since 1963, following the SALT I and ABM Treaties
• The Habits: Playing Pong at the arcade, tossing Hacky Sacks, watching The Godfather
• The Conversation: Did you see The Godfather? And what do you think about Nixon going to China?

Top Ten Baby Names of 1972

Girls: Jennifer, Michelle, Lisa, Kimberly, Amy Boys: Michael, Christopher, James, David, John

Jennifer had extended its run at the top for girls. Michael remained dominant for boys, a position it had held for most of the preceding two decades. Michelle had climbed into the top five for girls, driven in part by the Beatles song of the same name from seven years earlier, whose influence on naming had proven both lasting and delayed.

The Hotties, Sex Symbols, and Fashion Icons of 1972

Adrienne Barbeau, Dyan Cannon, Lynda Carter, Pam Grier, Peggy Lipton, Caroline Munro, Ingrid Pitt, Maria Schneider, Barbra Streisand, Diana Ross

Pam Grier defined the blaxploitation genre with a combination of physical presence and on-screen charisma that would make her a cult figure for decades. Barbra Streisand had What’s Up, Doc? and the Lady Sings the Blues soundtrack. Diana Ross was at the peak of her solo career.

Hollywood Hunks and Leading Men of 1972

Richard Roundtree, Burt Reynolds, Marlon Brando, Elvis Presley

Marlon Brando’s portrayal of Vito Corleone in The Godfather — delivered with cotton stuffed in his cheeks and a rasp he had developed specifically for the role — was immediately recognized as one of the finest performances in American cinema. Burt Reynolds had posed for Cosmopolitan magazine’s centerfold in April 1972 and was rapidly becoming one of the most recognizable faces in Hollywood. Richard Roundtree had been Shaft since the previous year and remained the defining cool of the moment.

The Quotes

“I’m going to make him an offer he can’t refuse.” — Marlon Brando as Vito Corleone in The Godfather, a line so embedded in American popular culture that it has been used in roughly one negotiation in ten ever since

“A mind is a terrible thing to waste.” — United Negro College Fund, in one of the most effective public service advertising lines in American history, still in use today

“Hey, Mikey! He likes it!” — Life cereal advertisement, featuring three brothers and a bowl of cereal that became one of the most beloved and most replayed television commercials of the decade

“It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken.” — Frank Perdue, in a campaign that made a chicken farmer one of the most recognizable faces in American advertising

“Nothing runs like a Deere.” — John Deere, a slogan that has the considerable advantage of being verifiably true

“In the fall of 1972, President Nixon announced that the rate of increase of inflation was decreasing. This was the first time a sitting president used the third derivative to advance his case for re-election.” — Mathematician Hugo Rossi, in 1996, noting that Nixon had deployed calculus in his campaign messaging without most voters noticing

Time Magazine’s Men of the Year

Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, jointly, for Nixon’s historic opening of diplomatic relations with China — his February visit was the first by an American president — and for the SALT I and Anti-Ballistic Missile treaties signed with the Soviet Union in May. The selections recognized a year of foreign policy achievement that was unfolding simultaneously with the domestic conduct that would eventually consume the administration.

Miss America and Miss USA

Miss America: Laura Lea Schaefer, Bexley, Ohio
Miss USA: Tanya Wilson, Hawaii

We Lost in 1972

J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation since 1924, died May 2, 1972, at age 77. He had served as FBI director for 48 years under eight presidents, building the bureau into an instrument of considerable power and wielding it to include surveillance of civil rights leaders, politicians, and private citizens. His death revealed the existence of files he had maintained on prominent Americans — files that were used, among other purposes, to ensure his continued tenure by making his removal politically dangerous. His successor, L. Patrick Gray, was named acting director.

Jackie Robinson, the baseball player who had broken Major League Baseball’s color barrier in 1947 and whose courage and skill in doing so made him one of the most significant figures in American sports history, died October 24, 1972, at age 53, of a heart attack, having struggled with diabetes and heart disease for years. Nine days before his death, he had thrown out the first pitch at the second game of the World Series and delivered a brief speech calling for greater representation of Black Americans in baseball’s managerial and front office ranks. Major League Baseball retired his number 42 across all teams in 1997.

Roberto Clemente, the Pittsburgh Pirates right fielder who had been one of the finest baseball players of his generation and one of its most respected citizens, died December 31, 1972, at age 38, when the cargo plane he had chartered to deliver relief supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua crashed into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after takeoff from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Clemente had personally supervised the loading of the relief supplies after reports that previous shipments were being diverted by Nicaraguan government officials. Major League Baseball waived the usual five-year waiting period and inducted him into the Hall of Fame in 1973.

America in 1972 — The Context

It was a presidential election year. Richard Nixon, running against Democratic Senator George McGovern of South Dakota, won re-election with 520 electoral votes to McGovern’s 17 — one of the largest margins in American electoral history. Nixon carried 49 of 50 states. McGovern carried Massachusetts and the District of Columbia. The campaign’s outcome was not in doubt for most of the year; the Watergate break-in occurred in June and was not yet a significant political story by November.

Nixon’s diplomatic achievements were extraordinary by any standard. His February visit to China — the first by an American president — ended 23 years of no official contact between the two countries. The joint communiqué signed with Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai established the framework for the normalization of relations that was completed in 1979. The SALT I Treaty and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, signed with Soviet Premier Brezhnev in May, were the most significant arms control agreements since the nuclear age began.

On June 17, five men connected to Nixon’s reelection campaign were arrested inside the Democratic National Committee offices at the Watergate Complex in Washington. The story was initially treated as a minor incident — a bungled burglary — and received little attention in the presidential campaign. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein of the Washington Post began investigating the connections between the break-in and the White House. The full story would unfold over the following two years, culminating in Nixon’s resignation in August 1974.

The Munich Massacre

On September 5, 1972, eight members of the Palestinian group Black September took eleven members of the Israeli Olympic team hostage at the Munich Olympic Village. After a failed rescue attempt by West German police, all eleven hostages were killed, along with one West German police officer and five of the eight attackers. The remaining three attackers were captured but released two months later after a Lufthansa hijacking. Israel subsequently launched Operation Wrath of God, a covert campaign to assassinate those responsible for planning the attack. The Munich Olympics continued after a brief suspension — a decision that was controversial at the time and remains so.

The event had a permanent effect on Olympic security, on counter-terrorism policy, and on the relationship between the State of Israel and the Palestinian liberation movement. Steven Spielberg’s 2005 film Munich dramatized the Israeli response.

The Watergate Break-In

On June 17, 1972, five men were arrested inside the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Complex in Washington DC. They had been attempting to photograph documents and plant listening devices. Investigation revealed that the operation had been authorized by officials connected to Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect the President. The White House attempted to contain the damage through a cover-up that included payments to the burglars, destruction of evidence, and pressure on intelligence and law enforcement officials. The cover-up ultimately proved more damaging than the original crime. Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974, the first and only president to do so.

Pop Culture Facts and History

The Godfather, directed by Francis Ford Coppola and based on Mario Puzo’s novel, opened on March 15, 1972. It grossed $246 million in the United States — the highest-grossing film in history at the time — and won the Academy Award for Best Picture. Marlon Brando, who had spent years being considered difficult and commercially unreliable, delivered a performance universally recognized as one of the finest in American film. He declined the Best Actor Oscar, sending a Native American activist named Sacheen Littlefeather to read a statement about Hollywood’s treatment of Native Americans. Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, and Diane Keaton launched or significantly advanced their careers through the film.

Atari was founded on June 27, 1972, by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney in Sunnyvale, California, with an initial investment of $250. The company’s first product, Pong, was released as an arcade game in November 1972 and became the first commercially successful video arcade game. The cabinet installed at Andy Capp’s Tavern in Sunnyvale had to be serviced within days of installation because the coin box had overflowed with quarters.

HBO — Home Box Office — launched November 8, 1972, on a cable system serving 365 households in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. The first program was a hockey game. The service offered films and sports events without commercials for a monthly subscription fee. It was the first premium cable channel in the United States and the beginning of what would eventually become the most critically acclaimed television network in American history.

Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad had all been performing separately in the Swedish music scene when they began working together informally in 1972. They performed together publicly for the first time as a named act — ABBA — at the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest, where they won with Waterloo. The 1972 period marked the informal beginning of what would become one of the best-selling musical acts in history.

The US Men’s Basketball team entered the 1972 Munich Olympics with a 63-0 Olympic record. In the gold medal final against the Soviet Union, the Americans appeared to win 50-49 with three seconds remaining on a Doug Collins free throw. The game was restarted twice, with time restored on two separate occasions by officials who claimed timing errors — both times giving the Soviets another chance. They scored a basket on the third ending and won 51-50. The United States filed a formal protest that was rejected. All 12 American players voted unanimously to refuse the silver medals. They remain uncollected in a vault in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Mark Spitz won seven gold medals at the Munich Olympics — in the 100m freestyle, 200m freestyle, 100m butterfly, 200m butterfly, 4x100m freestyle relay, 4x200m freestyle relay, and 4x100m medley relay — setting world records in all seven events. It was the most gold medals won by any athlete at a single Olympics. The record was not broken until Michael Phelps won eight at the 2008 Beijing Games. Spitz reportedly told the Soviet swim coach, in the joking tone of a man who had just won seven gold medals, that his mustache improved his performance by deflecting water from his mouth. The following season, a number of Soviet swimmers reportedly grew mustaches.

The Dallas Cowboys formalized their professional cheerleading squad in 1972, creating the template for NFL cheerleading as a performance art rather than merely a function of crowd enthusiasm. The Cowboys Cheerleaders became the most recognized cheerleading organization in American sports history.

Ted Bundy was appointed to the Seattle Crime Prevention Advisory Committee in 1972. He used the resources and credibility available to him in that role in ways that the appointment committee would not have anticipated.

Vesna Vulović, a flight attendant for Yugoslav Airlines, survived a fall of 33,333 feet — approximately 6.3 miles — on January 26, 1972, when a bomb in the baggage compartment of JAT Flight 367 tore the aircraft apart over Czechoslovakia. She was the only survivor, found by rescuers still conscious inside a section of the fuselage. Her injuries included a fractured skull, two broken legs, three broken vertebrae, and broken ribs. She recovered, returned to work for the airline, and held the Guinness World Record for the highest fall survived without a parachute.

Nacho cheese Doritos were introduced in 1972, adding to the plain tortilla chip and taco flavors that Frito-Lay had already established. Nacho cheese has been the best-selling flavor in the line for over five decades.

Walt Disney was not cryogenically frozen. He was cremated on December 17, 1966, and his ashes were interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. The rumor that he wanted to be frozen began in 1972 with the president of the California Cryogenics Society and has been repeated ever since, despite consistent denials from his family.

The Dallas Cowboys hired the NFL’s first professional cheerleading squad in 1972. The squad’s combination of choreographed routines and distinctive uniforms set a template that transformed how NFL franchises approached game-day entertainment.

George Carlin was arrested in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on July 21, 1972, for violating obscenity laws after performing his Seven Dirty Words bit at a Summerfest concert. The charges were later dismissed. His subsequent recording of the routine was used in a radio broadcast that became the subject of a Supreme Court case — FCC v. Pacifica Foundation in 1978 — establishing the legal framework for broadcast content regulation that remained in effect for decades.

Nobel Prize Winners in 1972

Physics was awarded to John Bardeen, Leon Cooper, and John Schrieffer for their jointly developed theory of superconductivity, usually called the BCS theory. Bardeen was awarded his second Nobel Prize in Physics, the only person in history to receive the prize in the same category twice. His first had been for the transistor in 1956.

Chemistry went to Christian Anfinsen for his work on ribonuclease, particularly concerning the connection between the amino acid sequence and the biologically active conformation, and to Stanford Moore and William Stein for their contribution to the understanding of the connection between chemical structure and catalytic activity of the active center of the ribonuclease molecule.

Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Gerald Edelman and Rodney Porter for their discoveries concerning the chemical structure of antibodies — work that explained how the immune system recognizes and targets foreign substances with extraordinary specificity.

Literature went to Heinrich Böll of West Germany, for his writing, which, through its combination of a broad perspective on his time and a sensitive skill in characterization, has contributed to a renewal of German literature. Böll had been a significant voice in postwar German literature and his receipt of the prize was widely seen as recognition of the moral seriousness with which German writers had engaged with their country’s recent history.

Peace was not awarded in 1972. The Nobel Committee found no suitable candidate.

Economics turned to John Hicks and Kenneth Arrow for their pioneering contributions to general economic equilibrium theory and welfare theory — mathematical work that formalized the conditions under which markets could be expected to produce efficient outcomes and those under which they could not.

1972 Toys and Christmas Gifts

Pong cabinets were appearing in arcades and bars across the country, though home versions were still years away. Atari’s coin-operated original was sufficiently popular that competitors were producing imitations within months. Dawn dolls, Hacky Sacks, Seance Games, and Nerf Footballs rounded out the season for children who did not have access to an arcade.

Broadway in 1972

Grease, the musical set in the late 1950s at a fictional Chicago high school, opened on February 14, 1972, at the Eden Theatre before transferring to Broadway. It ran until April 13, 1980, completing 3,388 performances — the longest run of any Broadway musical at the time, later surpassed by A Chorus Line and eventually many others. The original production was considerably rougher and more explicitly sexual than the 1978 film adaptation that most people know.

Pippin, with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and direction and choreography by Bob Fosse, opened October 23, 1972, and ran until June 12, 1977, completing 1,944 performances. Fosse’s staging — theatrical, precise, visually distinctive — defined the production, and Ben Vereen’s performance as the Leading Player won the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical.

Best Film Oscar Winner

The French Connection, directed by William Friedkin and starring Gene Hackman as Detective Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle, won Best Picture at the 44th Academy Awards on March 27, 1972, for the 1971 film year. Hackman won Best Actor. The film’s chase sequence — Doyle pursuing a suspect on an elevated train through Brooklyn streets — was filmed largely without permits and without the full knowledge of the New York City Police Department and is considered one of the great action sequences in cinema. Charlie Chaplin received a 12-minute standing ovation at the same ceremony when he was presented with an Honorary Oscar — the longest ovation in the Academy’s history. He had been banned from the United States in 1952 and had not returned until the Academy’s invitation.

Top Movies of 1972

1. The Godfather
2. The Poseidon Adventure
3. What’s Up, Doc?
4. Deliverance
5. Jeremiah Johnson
6. Cabaret
7. The Getaway
8. Last Tango in Paris
9. Lady Sings the Blues
10. Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex

The Godfather was so far ahead of everything else that calling it the highest-grossing film of the year understates the case. Deliverance, directed by John Boorman and based on James Dickey’s novel, introduced Burt Reynolds to mainstream audiences and featured the Dueling Banjos sequence, which became one of the most recognizable pieces of music associated with a film. Cabaret, directed by Bob Fosse and set in pre-war Berlin, won eight Academy Awards — everything except Best Picture and Best Actor, which went to The Godfather and Marlon Brando. Last Tango in Paris, directed by Bernardo Bertolucci and starring Brando and Maria Schneider, generated more controversy per minute of screen time than almost any other film of the year.

Most Popular TV Shows of 1972

1. All in the Family (CBS)
2. Sanford and Son (NBC)
3. Hawaii Five-O (CBS)
4. Maude (CBS)
5. Bridget Loves Bernie (CBS)
6. The Mary Tyler Moore Show (CBS)
7. Gunsmoke (CBS)
8. The Wonderful World of Disney (NBC)
9. Ironside (NBC)
10. Adam-12 (NBC)

All in the Family was in its second season and was establishing itself as the most discussed show on American television — a comedy that used a bigoted working-class protagonist to satirize the very attitudes he expressed, in a way that divided audiences over whether they were laughing at Archie Bunker or with him. Sanford and Son, created by Norman Lear and starring Redd Foxx, premiered January 14, 1972, and immediately climbed to second place in the ratings, one of the fastest rises of any new series in television history. Maude, a spinoff from All in the Family, starred Bea Arthur as a liberal counterpart to Archie Bunker and addressed abortion in a two-part episode that generated more mail to CBS than any episode of any series to that point.

1972 Billboard Number One Hits

December 25, 1971 – January 14, 1972: Brand New Key — Melanie (carryover from late 1971)
January 15 – February 11: American Pie — Don McLean (4 weeks)
February 12 – February 18: Let’s Stay Together — Al Green
February 19 – March 17: Without You — Nilsson (4 weeks)
March 18 – March 24: Heart of Gold — Neil Young
March 25 – April 14: A Horse with No Name — America
April 15 – May 26: The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face — Roberta Flack (6 weeks)
May 27 – June 2: Oh Girl — Chi-Lites
June 3 – June 9: I’ll Take You There — The Staple Singers
June 10 – June 30: The Candy Man — Sammy Davis Jr. (3 weeks)
July 1 – July 7: Song Sung Blue — Neil Diamond
July 8 – July 28: Lean on Me — Bill Withers (3 weeks)
July 29 – August 25: Alone Again (Naturally) — Gilbert O’Sullivan (6 weeks, two non-consecutive runs)
August 26 – September 1: Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl) — Looking Glass
September 2 – September 15: Alone Again (Naturally) — Gilbert O’Sullivan (return run)
September 16 – September 22: Black and White — Three Dog Night
September 23 – October 13: Baby Don’t Get Hooked on Me — Mac Davis (3 weeks)
October 14 – October 20: Ben — Michael Jackson
October 21 – November 3: My Ding-a-Ling — Chuck Berry (2 weeks)
November 4 – December 1: I Can See Clearly Now — Johnny Nash (4 weeks)
December 2 – December 8: Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone — The Temptations
December 9 – December 15: I Am Woman — Helen Reddy
December 16, 1972 – January 5, 1973: Me and Mrs. Jones — Billy Paul (carrying into 1973)

American Pie by Don McLean opened the year at number one, an eight-minute meditation on the death of Buddy Holly and the corruption of the American cultural dream, spending four weeks at the top, and has been analyzed in university courses ever since. The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face by Roberta Flack, recorded in 1969 and re-released after appearing in a Clint Eastwood film, spent six weeks at number one. Ben, Michael Jackson’s solo ballad about a rat, was his second number one and his last until Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough in 1979. Chuck Berry’s My Ding-a-Ling — a live recording of a song he had been performing since the 1950s — was his only number one single in a career that had produced Johnny B. Goode, Roll Over Beethoven, and Maybellene. I Am Woman by Helen Reddy became an anthem for the women’s liberation movement and spent one week at the top of the chart in December. Lean on Me by Bill Withers, from his Still Bill album, spent three weeks at number one and has been covered and sampled more times than its author could have anticipated.

Sports Champions of 1972

World Series: The Oakland Athletics defeated the Cincinnati Reds four games to three, winning the first of three consecutive World Series championships. The A’s were one of the most colorful teams in baseball history — owned by the flamboyant Charlie Finley, wearing green and gold uniforms, sporting mustaches that Finley paid his players bonuses to grow, and producing results that justified the eccentricity. Gene Tenace hit four home runs in the series and was named MVP.

Super Bowl VI: The Dallas Cowboys defeated the Miami Dolphins 24-3 on January 16, 1972, in New Orleans. Roger Staubach was named MVP. The Cowboys had narrowly lost Super Bowl V the previous year; their 1972 victory was the first of two championships in the decade. The Dolphins went 17-0 the following season, the only perfect season in NFL history.

NBA Champions: The Los Angeles Lakers defeated the New York Knicks four games to one, completing one of the most dominant regular seasons in NBA history — the Lakers had won 33 consecutive games, a record that has never been broken. Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, and Gail Goodrich were the core of a team that ended years of near-misses. Jerry West was the only player ever named Finals MVP from the losing team in 1969; he finally got a ring in 1972.

Stanley Cup: The Boston Bruins defeated the New York Rangers four games to two. Bobby Orr, despite playing on a knee that would require surgery, was the dominant player of the series. It was the Bruins’ second Cup in three years.

U.S. Open Golf: Jack Nicklaus won at Pebble Beach Golf Links in Pacific Grove, California, by three shots. The performance is considered one of the most dominant in U.S. Open history. Nicklaus hit a one-iron on the 17th hole in the final round that struck the flagstick, settling close enough for a birdie that effectively decided the championship.

U.S. Open Tennis: Ilie Nastase of Romania won the men’s title, and Billie Jean King won the women’s. Nastase, known as Nasty for his on-court behavior, was one of the most talented and most controversial players of his era.

Wimbledon: Stan Smith of the United States won the men’s title in five sets over Nastase, and Billie Jean King won the women’s title. Smith’s win is remembered partly for the tennis shoes that subsequently bore his name — the Adidas Stan Smith, one of the best-selling athletic shoes in history.

NCAA Football: USC, under coach John McKay, won the national championship. The Trojans were led by tailback Anthony Davis and featured one of the most talented rosters in college football of the era.

NCAA Basketball: UCLA, under coach John Wooden, won the national championship — their sixth in seven years. Bill Walton scored 24 of his 26 points in the second half of the final against Florida State. Wooden’s dynasty was in its middle period; the run from 1964 to 1975 produced ten national championships.

Kentucky Derby: Riva Ridge, trained by Lucien Laurin for owner Penny Chenery, won the Kentucky Derby and went on to win the Belmont Stakes, but did not run in the Preakness due to poor track conditions. The following year, Lucien Laurin and Penny Chenery would have a horse named Secretariat.

Baseball Hall of Fame: Sandy Koufax was inducted at age 36 — the youngest player ever elected at the time — five years after his retirement. Koufax retired in 1966 at the peak of his career due to severe arthritis in his left elbow, going 27-9 with a 1.73 ERA in his final season. His election was immediate and unanimous.

Frequently Asked Questions About 1972

Q: What was the Watergate break-in?
A: On June 17, 1972, five men connected to President Nixon’s reelection campaign were arrested inside the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Complex in Washington DC, having broken in to photograph documents and plant listening devices. The subsequent cover-up — which included payments to the burglars, destruction of evidence, and obstruction of the FBI investigation — ultimately led to Nixon’s resignation on August 9, 1974, the first and only presidential resignation in American history.

Q: What happened at the 1972 Munich Olympics?
A: On September 5, 1972, eight members of the Palestinian group Black September took eleven Israeli Olympic athletes hostage at the Olympic Village. After a failed rescue attempt by West German police, all eleven hostages were killed. The games continued after a brief suspension. The event permanently changed Olympic security protocols and Israeli counter-terrorism policy.

Q: Why did the US Men’s Basketball team refuse their silver medals?
A: The United States entered the 1972 Olympic final with a 63-0 Olympic record. In a game that ended three times — with officials twice restoring time on disputed grounds after the Americans appeared to have won — the Soviet Union scored on the third ending to win 51-50. The American team voted unanimously to refuse the silver medals, which remain uncollected in a vault in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Q: What was The Godfather‘s cultural impact?
A: The Godfather was the highest-grossing film in history at the time of its release, won Best Picture, and is consistently ranked among the greatest films ever made. It redefined the crime film genre, launched or advanced the careers of Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, and Diane Keaton, and produced lines of dialogue that have been in continuous cultural circulation ever since. Marlon Brando declined the Best Actor Oscar in protest of Hollywood’s treatment of Native Americans.

Q: What did the Doomsday Clock move to in 1972?
A: The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists moved the Doomsday Clock to 12 minutes to midnight in 1972, following the SALT I Treaty and Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty signed between the United States and the Soviet Union. It was the furthest from midnight the Clock had been set since 1963, reflecting genuine progress in nuclear arms control.

Q: Was Walt Disney cryogenically frozen?
A: No. Walt Disney was cremated on December 17, 1966, and his ashes were interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. The rumor began in 1972 with the president of the California Cryogenics Society and has been repeated despite being repeatedly denied by Disney’s family.

In a year when Nixon went to China, broke into Watergate, and won re-election with 49 states, when The Godfather arrived and changed what movies could be, when eleven Israeli athletes were murdered in Munich and the US basketball team refused to accept second place, and when a woman fell six miles from a disintegrating aircraft and survived, 1972 delivered the full range of what a year can contain. Atari was founded with $250. HBO launched on a cable system serving 365 households. ABBA began. The nacho cheese Dorito was introduced. Not everything consequential announces itself at the time.