1972
Centuries: 19th century - 20th century - 21st century
Decades: 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s - 1970s - 1980s 1990s 2000s
Years: 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 - 1972 - 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977
Events
- Prime minister of Sweden, Olof Palme compares the American bombings of North Vietnam to Nazi massacres. The US breaks diplomatic contact with Sweden.
- January 2 – Major robbery in Pierre Hotel, New York. $4 million dollars worth of valuables stolen.
- January 5 - President of the United States Richard Nixon orders the development of a space shuttle program.
- January 4 – Kurt Waldheim becomes the Secretary General of United Nations.
- January 9 - RMS Queen Elizabeth is destroyed by fire (Hong Kong harbor).
- January 9 - Rose Heilbron becomes the first woman judge in the United Kingdom (Old Bailey, London).
- January 11 - East Pakistan becomes Bangladesh
- January 14 – King Fredrik III of Denmark dies – his daughter Queen Margaret II of Denmark asends to the throne at January 16
- January 24 - Japanese soldier Shoichi Yokoi discovered in Guam. He had spent 28 years in the jungle
- January 26 – Yugoslavian air stewardress Vesca Vulovic is the only survivor when her plane crashes in Chechoslovakia.
- January 30 – Bloody Sunday in Londonderry, Northern Ireland. British soldiers shoot at demonstrators and kill 13.
- February 1 - First scientific hand-held calculator (HP-35) introduced (prize $395)
- February 3 - Sapporo Winter Olympics begin.
- February 4 – Mariner 9 sends pictures from Mars
- February 9 - British government declares a state of emergency over a miner’s strike
- February 17 – Sales of the Wolkswagen Beetle model exceed those of T-Model Ford – 15 million
- February 21 - February 27 - President Richard M. Nixon makes an unprecedented eight-day visit to Communist China and meets with Mao Zedong.
- February 23 – Lufthansa plane hijacked to Aden. Passengers are released after ransom on 16 million D-marks.
- March 2 - Launch of Pioneer 10 spacecraft.
- March 13 – Britain and China resume full diplomatic relations after 22 years. Britain withdraws its consulate from Taiwan.
- March 24 - In a bid for peace, Britain takes over direct rule of Northern Ireland.
- April 16 – Apollo 16 launched
- April 17 – Communists take capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh.
- April 18 - Roland Corporation founded in Osaka
- May 9 – Three out of six bombs explode in Springer newspaper building in Hamburg, West Germany. 17 dead.
- May 15 - Governor George C. Wallace of Alabama is shot by Arthur H. Bremer at a Laurel, Md., political rally.
- May 21 – In Rome, Laszlo Toth attacks Michelangelo’s Pieta-statue with a hammer
- May 22 – Ceylon becomes republic of Sri Lanka
- May 26 – Richard Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev sign SALT treaty in Moscow.
- June 2 – Andreas Baader and some other members of Red Army Faction are arrested in Frankfurt am Main after a shootout.
- June 4 – Angela Davis found not guilty of murder
- June 14 – June 23 - Hurricane Agnes kills 117 in US east coast.
- June 15 – Ulrike Meinhof and Gerhard Müller of Red Army Faction are arrested in a teacher’s apartment in Hannover, West Germany.
- June 17 - Watergate break-in, Washington, D.C.
- Return of Okinawa from United States' control to Japan.
- June 29 - United States Supreme Court rules that the death penalty is unconstitutional
- July 18 – Anwar Sadat sends Soviet military advisors home.
- August 4 – Idi Amin declares that Uganda will expel 50.000 asians with British passports to Britain within three months;
- September 1 – Bobby Fischer defeats Boris Spassky in Reykjavik Chess tournament and becomes the first American chess champion.
- September 5 - Eleven Israeli athletes at the Summer Olympic Games in Munich are killed after eight members of an Arab terrorist group Black September invade Olympic Village; five guerillas and one policeman are also killed.
- September 14 – West Germany and Poland renew diplomatic relations.
- September 17 – Uganda announces that there is {{Tanzania]]n troops in its territory.
- September 23 – Ferdinand Marcos declares martial law in Philippines.
- October 2 – Denmark joins EEC. Pharoe Islands stay out.
- October 5 – United Reformed Church founded out of Congregational and Presbyrerian Churches.
- October 13 – Fairchild passenger plane transporting a rugby team crashes in Andes. They are found alive December 20 but they have had to resort to cannibalism to survive.
- October 17 – Queen Elizabeth visits Ýugoslavia.
- November 5 – Group of Amerindians occupies the Bureau of Indian Affairs
- November - Richard M. Nixon defeats George McGovern in the U.S. presidential election
- December 22 – Earthquake destroys Managua, capital of Nicaragua.
- December 28 – Bones of Martin Bormann identified in Berlin.
- December 29 - An Eastern Air Lines Lockheed L-1011 crashes into the Everglades killing 99 of 163 onboard
- British begin to train Special Air Service for anti-terrorist duties.
- Sally Priesand becomes the first female rabbi.
- Steve Jobs graduates from Homestead High School and enrols in Reed college in Portland but drops out after one semester
- Kim Il Sung becomes a president of North Korea.
- First Crey super computers
- Japanese begin building a railway tunnel between Honshu and Hokkaido
- Stephen Hawking is confined to wheelchair
- The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms becomes independent from IRS.
Art, Culture & Fashion
- 1972 in film
- 1972 in literature
- 1972 in music
- 1972 in sports
- January 16 - Super Bowl VI Dallas Cowboys (24) def. Miami Dolphins (3)
- 1972 in television
- January 14 - Sanford & Son premieres on NBC.
- M*A*S*H premieres
- James Herriot - All Creatures Great and Small
Births
- February 11 - Dennis Iliohan, Dutch football player.
- March 23 - Judith Godrèche, actress
- June 29 - Samantha Smith, U.S. activist.
Deaths
- January 1 – Maurice Chevalier, French entertainer, surgical complications
- January 14 - King Frederick IX of Denmark
- February 11 - Jan Wils, architect
- March 27 – M. C. Escher, Dutch graphic artist
- May 2 - J. Edgar Hoover, FBI director
- May 21 – Margaret Rutherford, actress
- May 28 – Duke of Windsor, former king of England
- October 1 – Louis Leakey, British paleontologist
- October 24 - Jackie Robinson (Baseball Hall of Famer)
- October 26 –Igor Sikorsky, aviation engineer
- November 1 – Ezra Pound, poet
- November 28 – Sibylla, queen of Sweden.
- Decemebr 26 – Harry S Truman, US president, heart failure.
- December 31 - Roberto Clemente (baseball Hall of Famer)