The Rock 'n' Roll Years

Mary Whitehouse launches her "Clean-up TV" campaign; in South Africa, Nelson Mandela goes to prison; the Beatles' first film, A HARD DAY'S NIGHT is released; George Brown, the First Secretary of State and Minister for Economic Affairs, and Robin Day, the broadcaster, do a double-act.

Lyndon B Johnson is voted president of the Unitted States of America; Winston Churchill dies; ex-Beatle John Lennon publishes a book; P.J.Proby's trousers split once too often and create havoc; Rhodesia seeks independence form Britain; in Los Angeles the Watts Riots break out.

England win the World Cup against Germany 4-2; John Lennon incurs the wrath of the American Bible Belt by declaring that the Beatles are more popular than Jesus; Ronald Reagan is elected Governor of California; nuclear bombs go astray in Spain.

The year of hippies and flower power; China undergoes the Cultural Revolution; the Six Day War breaks out in the Middle East; pirate radio stations are declared illegal; breathalysers are introduced in an attempt to reduce the amount of drinking and driving; the tanker Torrey Canyon went aground off Land's End resulting in a large oil slick.

The Vietcong launch the Tet Offensive; Russia invades Czechoslovakia; strikes and demonstrations in France leave the country on the brink of civil war; Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy are assassinated in the United States; Oliver Tobias and Paul Nicholas sing together in the musical Hair (see credit list).

Neil Armstrong is the first man on the moon; the Rolling Stones play in Hyde Park; music festivals are held at Woodstock, USA and the Isle of Wight, England; Edward Kennedy leaves Mary Jo Kopechne to drown in the back of his car at Chappaquiddick; Sharon Tate is murdered by Charles Manson and other members of "The Family" at her home in Cielo Drive, Los Angeles; the Rolling Stones play at Altamont festival in the USA and a member of the audience is killed.

The age of majority is lowered to 18; George Best makes football as attractive as rock 'n' roll; four students at Kent State University are fatally shot by police during demonstrations against Nixon's involvement in the war with Cambodia; young Dutch Catholics want an end to priestly celibacy; skinheads make reggae music their own.

Cambridge dons join their students in demonstrating against the deportation of Rudi Dutschke; Daniel Ellsberg risks jail by leaking Pentagon secrets; a million British workers strike against Conservative industrial policy, John Lennon cheers them on with 'Power to the People'; footage of an epic performance of 'While my guitar gently weeps' by Eric Clapton and George Harrison.