What happened this month 50 years ago.
The last cigarette commercials on U.S. television and radio were broadcast on January 1. Just before the midnight deadline, a commercial for Virginia Slims showed on NBC’s The Tonight Show. Not sure if the ad below is the very last commercial, but it is reflective of the time.
In the only known instance of the Harlem Globetrotters being defeated by the designated losers in their exhibitions, the New Jersey Reds beat the Globetrotters 100-99 in Martin, Tenn., on January 5. The owner of the Reds said his team played under contract with the Globetrotters but they were not instructed to lose. On the same day, former world heavyweight boxing champion Sonny Liston was found dead in his home in Las Vegas. A coroner surmised that Liston had died on December 30 after falling while alone.
The drama anthology television series Masterpiece Theatre, produced by Boston’s WGBH, debuted on the Public Broadcasting System on January 10. The initial series was The First Churchills, a BBC drama, introduced by series host Alistair Cooke.
The iconic television series All in the Family premiered on January 12. Criticized as vulgar and unfunny, it was also praised for its boldness and brashness. Initially not that popular, reviews and popular word helped make it the #1-rated show by the end of the 1971-72 season.
The Baltimore Colts defeated the Dallas Cowboys, 16-13, in Super Bowl V on January 17. It was the first Super Bowl after the merger of the National and American football leagues.
U.S. Senator George McGovern of South Dakota became the first person to announce his candidacy for the Presidency in the 1972 election on January 18. It was, at the time, the earliest date such an announcement had been made.
Charles Manson and three “Manson Family” members were convicted of murder on January 25 in Los Angeles. Manson, Patricia Krenwinkel, and Susan Atkins were found guilty of committing the Tate-LaBianca murders of August 9 and 10, 1969, in which seven people were murdered, while Leslie Van Houten was found guilty of five killings.
Court martial charges related to the My Lai massacre against Army Major General Samuel Koster, accused of trying to cover up the mass killings of Vietnamese civilians by U.S. soldiers in March 1968, were dropped on January 29 by the commanding general of the U.S. First Army.
The UCLA men’s basketball team beat UC Santa Barbara, 74-61, on January 30, beginning what would become an 88-game winning streak lasting three years. That first win came a week after the Bruins had lost to Notre Dame. On January 19, 1974, Notre Dame would also end the UCLA streak, 71-70.