Tag Archive for: memories

memories of 1975

Image by brizzle born and bred
1975 UK murders and IRA dominated the headlines

1975 In the UK inflation continues to spiral out of control reaching 24.2% the price of Petrol increased by nearly 70% in one year, but the US sees a start back down with US inflation going down to 9.2%, both governments use interest rates as a way of trying to control inflation with the US Federal Reserve at 7.25% and The Bank of England at 11.25%. Meanwhile one of the true success stories of modern times when Bill Gates and Paul Allen create the company Microsoft. The First of the new hobby computers are starting to appear including Altair 8800 and the battle for Video recorder standards of VHS and Betamax starts. This is also the year the Vietnam war finally ends.

In January 1975 Margaret Thatcher challenged Heath for the leadership of the Conservative Party. On 4th February Thatcher defeated Heath by 130 votes to 119 and became the first woman leader of a major political party. Heath took the defeat badly and refused to serve in Thatcher’s shadow cabinet. He considered Thatcher to be a right-wing authoritarian and like another former Conservative prime minister, Harold Macmillan, Heath constantly criticized her policies.

Back to the future? Britain’s 1975 referendum on Europe, 67% of Britons voted to stay in the European Economic Community

40 years ago, Harold Wilson announced that a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Community would be held within six months. On 23 January 1975, Prime Minister Harold Wilson announced that a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Economic Community would be held within six months. Forty years on, the pressure for a similar in-out referendum on EU membership is mounting. David Cameron has promised to hold a vote no later than the end of 2017.

The circumstances that produced the 1975 referendum and those that may well produce another in the near future are uncannily similar. In the early Seventies, Labour was split over Europe. The parliamentary party was overwhelmingly in favour of Britain’s membership of the Common Market, but much of the rank and file wanted out. When Tony Benn, the unofficial leader of Labour’s anti-marketeers, first put forward the idea of holding a referendum, the party leadership snubbed his proposal. But, as Jim Callaghan presciently remarked in 1970, the referendum idea was "a little rubber life raft into which the whole party may one day have to climb".

Five years later, the whole party had indeed clambered into the little rubber life raft and the Conservatives poured scorn on them for doing so. Margaret Thatcher derided Labour’s decision to hold a referendum as, "a tactical device to get over a split in their own party". She accused the government of being, "incapable of making a decision’ and ‘passing the buck to the people".

Those words could come back to bite Thatcher’s successors at Tory HQ.

Britain’s Worst Road Accident

Though the number of road users has continued to rise year-on-year, it may surprise some that the number of road deaths annually has plummeted since the figure reached its peak in 1966, when 7985 died on Britain’s highways. Vehicles have improved, with better brakes and the introduction of airbags a major help; and testing – the MOT test brought in in 1960 – is another reason for the fall, key systems like brakes checked as part of that work.

It was, however, a brake problem that led to Britain’s worst road accident, a coach crash in rural North Yorkshire in May 1975. Pensioners from Thornaby-on-Tees on a mystery tour organised by a former Mayor of the town were travelling on a 45-seater coach, heading for Grassington where they were to have tea, having visited Ripon and Knaresborough already.

On an exceptionally steep downward slope on the B6265 between Pateley Bridge and Hedben the stand-in driver missed a gear, and when he tried to slow the coach with his brakes they rapidly overheated and failed. In the subsequent investigation it was found that part of the braking system was inoperative. The coach careered down the one-in-six hill, slammed through a barrier and a bridge parapet, and fell upside-down into a garden 5m below, the glass-fibre roof of the coach crumpling uselessly.

Before he died at the scene the trapped driver told those who arrived to help the injured what had happened, his story confirmed by experts later. In all 33 people died in the crash.

Accident black-spots these days tend to have remedial work done on them to reduce their dangers. It is a tragedy that such thinking had not apparently applied to Dibbles Bridge and its approaches, the scene of the 1975 crash, for in June 1925 another coach crash on the same spot had claimed seven lives.

End of the IRA Balcombe Street siege

Four fugitives, two hostages, a car chase and a shoot-out; details of the Balcombe Street Siege read like a Hollywood script. Amid a tableau of bombings and executions, the six days of the siege in Marylebone were perhaps the most tense and dramatic of all the IRA’s activity, the crisis played out in front of a television audience of millions.

Mid-seventies London had long grown accustomed to the fear of bombings. The IRA’s campaign had arrived in the nation’s capital, immediately increasing tensions among the security forces. 35 people had died between 1974 and 1975, and there was no sign of any ceasefire, and then on 6th December, what began as a car chase ended in a hostage crisis in central London.

A huge undercover police operation had been put in place to track an IRA cell down. Scotts Restaurant, Mayfair , had been bombed a month earlier, and police surveillance on the building witnessed shots being fired into the restaurant from a stolen Ford Cortina. The men responsible were a notorious IRA active service unit and with the police in pursuit, a desperate car chase careered round London’s West End.

The police had commandeered a taxi cab, and unarmed, dodged bullets and traffic, eventually chasing the IRA unit into a block of flats on Balcombe Street.

Flat 22B was home to John and Sheila Matthews. Their front door was rushed and both were taken hostage – John Matthews was tied up with a pair of his wife’s tights while the gang demanded a safe passage to Ireland. That was only ever to remain a demand, and a stand-off ensued that would last the best part of a week. Chief negotiator on behalf of the police was Peter Imbert. He applied pressure on them to release the hostages, feeding their captors false information and denying them food. After six days the Balcombe Street gang surrendered.

Eddie Butler, Hugh Doherty, Harry Duggan and Joe O’Connell, were arrested and tried at the Old Bailey on seven counts of murder and conspiracy to cause explosions. Found guilty, they would spend the rest of their lives in prison. They were released under the Good Friday Peace Agreement of 1998.

First Episode of Fawlty Towers

Monty Python had finished by 1974, and for the last few shows John Cleese ’s involvement was only partial. The seeds for his next major project had though already been sown during a hotel stay with the other Pythons in Torquay in 1970 where the owner of the establishment had been incredibly rude to his guests. From that experience came Fawlty Towers, written with his wife (from 1968 to 1976) Connie Booth, who also appeared in the show.

The first episode, as of course intended, set the tone for the subsequent 11: Basil displays his gullibility and idiocy in his snobbish fawning over a conman posing as a member of the aristocracy, treating his other guests – including the undercover detective who saves Fawlty’s bacon – with rudeness and even ill-disguised contempt.

When the idea was permeatng through the BBC hierarchy it was much criticised, Head of Light Entertainment Bill Cotton thinking it unfunny; and another executive less than perceptive suggested the scene be shifted out of the hotel. But it was made, just 12 perfectly honed episodes. More than three decades later it is still regarded as one of the best ever British sitcoms, a classic in the theatre of embarrassment where we are not just laughing at Basil but at a bit of ourselves.

News Headlines

Murders

May 2015 – Police investigating the 1975 murders of a woman and a teenage girl 40 years ago have launched a fresh appeal for information.

Eve Stratford, 22, who worked at London’s Playboy club, was found with her throat slashed at her home in Leyton, east London, on the evening of 18 March 1975.

Six months later, on 3 September, 16-year-old Lynne Weedon was attacked and raped in an alleyway near her home in Hounslow, west London, as she returned from a night out with friends. She was found barely alive at an electricity sub-station the next morning and died a week later.

The murders were linked in 2004 after a DNA match was found in samples taken from the victims, who were not thought to have known each other.

POLICE failures meant officers failed to connect vital clues which could have led to Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe being arrested years earlier than he was.

15 August 1975 – A 46-year-old Halifax woman Olive Smelt was severely injured in a hammer attack in an alleyway in the town.

2011 – The Yorkshire Ripper’s second victim has died at the age of 82. Olive Smelt was attacked by Peter Sutcliffe at the start of his six-year reign of terror in August 1975. Mrs Smelt, then 46, was struck twice on the head with a hammer and slashed with a pickaxe near her home in Halifax, West Yorkshire. Crucially, police refused to believe Mrs Smelt when she told them her attacker had a Yorkshire accent.

27 August 1975 – A 14-year-old, Tracy Browne, was badly injured in a hammer attack in a country lane at Silsden, near Keighley.

Tracy Browne was a 14 year old schoolgirl when she was battered by the well described Sutcliffe who masturbated on her while touching her genital area. Tracy gave the police an accurate description of Peter Sutcliffe and it is amazing that it was not compared with the later descriptions such as Marilyn Moore’s and Doctor Bandara’s.

It is surprising that the police who interviewed Ripper suspects were not briefed on all descriptions of attackers of women in the area especially as Sutcliffe was well known to a number of detectives for more than three years before his arrest. Marcella Claxton gave a description of her attacker but this was never published to my knowledge. Her assailant’s white car, referred to in the newspaper article, was similar to one seen at the scene of the Lesley Moleseed murder about three months later but never traced.

30 October 1975 – West Yorkshire Police launched a murder investigation after 28-year-old prostitute Wilma McCann was found dead in Leeds.

Wilma McCann worked as a prostitute in Leeds. She was the first publicly acknowledged victim of the Ripper, who was to be branded as such after the linked murder of Emily Jackson in Leeds on the 20th January 1976 some 11 weeks later. Jackson’s murder was immediately linked to the murder of Wilma McCann because they were both prostitutes and in the same area and within a short interval of time and both were murdered with brutal violence by only 2 or 3 blows to the head, accompanied by sexual ritual. The Ripper was believed to have used a stone or some other blunt instrument to strike her down first. The subsequent murders were carried out with a hammer. Wilma had her throat cut. She received multiple stab wounds and was stripped. B blood semen was found on her. Only minimal details were released by police about her injuries.

‘Black Panther’ serial killer Donald Neilson

Neilson was the UK’s most wanted criminal in the 1970s after a string of robberies in which he shot dead three postmasters and murdered a young girl for her inheritance. He was given four life sentences in 1975 and was one of a small group of prisoners who were told they would spend the rest of their lives behind bars.

He got his nickname for the way he reacted when two police officers approached him after he aroused suspicion walking along a street as he prepared for a heist – they described him as having ‘fought like a cornered animal’. But it was his murder of Lesley Whittle that shocked the nation when she was found hanging from a wire noose in a drain system in March 1975. He planned to kidnap her after reading that Lesley, 17, had inherited £82,000 from her father. He broke into her family home in Shropshire and bound her with sticking plaster while her mother slept.

He left a note demanding £50,000 and threatened Lesley’s death if she involved the police. The teenager was kept at the bottom of a 54ft ventilation shaft linked to a disused mine in Kidsgrove, Staffordshire while there were several botched attempts to deliver the money.

During her kidnap, Neilson shot dead a security guard while attempting to rob a freight terminal. When police discovered his car a week later, they also found tapes of Lesley’s voice recorded in the underground chamber. Her body was eventually discovered hanging – although Neilson claimed that she accidentally slipped. Police said the most likely explanation was that he flew into a rage after a ransom drop went wrong.

It wasn’t until Christmas in 1975 that he was caught when police stumbled across him in Mansfield and matched his fingerprints to the ones in the ventilation shaft.

In 1976, Neilson was given four life sentences for his crime spree. It had been suggested he may be released at some point because of the length of time he had served but the High Court ruled he should stay in prision.

Serial killer Donald Neilson died in 2011 following a long struggle with motor neurone disease 35 years after being jailed. The prolific prisoner, dubbed the Black Panther during his 70s crime spree, died in hospital after being taken there from his cell at Norwich Prison.

TV presenter Ross McWhirter shot dead by IRA

Guinness Book of Records co-founder and editor Ross McWhirter has been shot dead outside his North London home. Mr McWhirter was hit at close range in the head and chest at 1845 GMT. He was taken to a local hospital, but died soon after being admitted. The well-known author and BBC Record Breakers presenter recently offered a reward of £50,000 for information leading to the arrest of IRA bombers.

Scotland Yard said no group had yet claimed to be behind the attack. The two gunmen are thought to have waited in the garden of the couple’s Enfield house for an hour while Mr McWhirter was in the house preparing to go out to the theatre. When Rosemary McWhirter arrived home, she got out of her blue Ford Granada and was approached by two men holding pistols. She ran into the house as her husband came to the front door and seconds later heard two shots. The killers then used her car to escape. Police later found the car abandoned a few miles away in Tottenham.

Mrs McWhirter and her two sons, Iain and James, were taken to a secret address soon after the murder, where they are being guarded around the clock. Mr McWhirter edited the Guinness Book of Records with his twin brother, Norris, and also worked closely with Guinness Director David Hoy, who said the outspoken critic of the IRA was aware he could be in danger. "He took normal precautions recommended by the police and always looked under his Mercedes – he also varied his routes home," he said.

The IRA gang who killed Ross McWhirter and carried out dozens of other attacks in London throughout 1975 was apprehended two weeks later. Martin O’Connell, Edward Butler, Harry Duggan and Hugh Doherty exchanged shots with police in central London on 6 December and escaped to a flat in Balcombe Street, taking two hostages.

The four men were arrested after a six-day siege, charged with 10 murders and 20 bombings and jailed for life in 1977.

They were freed in April 1999 under the terms of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement – the multi-party peace deal for Northern Ireland.

Norris McWhirter continued to edit the Guinness Book of Records until 1985 and presented BBC’s Record Breakers until 1994. He died in April 2004.

London’s Spaghetti House siege

The crisis began on 28 September when nine staff of the Spaghetti House chain gathered to collect the week’s takings amounting to almost £13,000. Three men burst in and led the staff, all Italians, down into a small basement storeroom. One man managed to escape and alert the police who quickly cordoned off the area. The gunmen held the rest in a storeroom, which was cramped and hot but well-stocked with tins of food. Over the next couple of days they released two hostages who became ill.

‘Hostages are coming out’

When it became clear the police would not give in to the gunmen’s demands, the siege finally ended at 0340 GMT today and Franklin Davies, the gang’s leader, shouted out: "The hostages are coming out." Commander Christopher Payne ordered them out one by one and the Italians emerged tentatively before collapsing into the arms of police and being taken by ambulance to hospital for check-ups. The Metropolitan Police had taken a hard-line but tactful approach to the situation.

It had dismissed the group’s claim it was part of a Black Panther splinter group, the Black Liberation Army, fighting against capitalism and the oppression of black people. After referring to Home Secretary Roy Jenkins, Sir Robert Mark, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, had refused their demands for a plane and safe passage to Jamaica. But the group had been given a radio, coffee and cigarettes in exchange for the release of two hostages who were unwell.

The freed hostages were Mario Roscelli, Enrico Mainini, Gino Barni, his brother Bruno, Renato Nasta and Giovanni Scrano. Two of the gunmen who are West Indian – Wesley Dick, aged 24 and Anthony Gordon Munroe, aged 22 – have been charged at Cannon Row Police Station. Davies, a 28-year-old Nigerian student, is being questioned at St George’s Hospital. Police had found him lying in the cellar with a gunshot wound and a .22 pistol beside him.

Praise for police

The Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, has sent a telegram to Sir Robert praising him for the successful handling of the siege, the first of its kind in Britain. At a news conference at Scotland Yard, Sir Robert paid tribute to the 400 officers who worked on securing the safe release of the hostages. He also praised Italian Consul General Mario Manca whom he described as "a sensitive, gallant and truly unselfish man" and presented him with a mounted crest of the coat of arms of the Metropolitan Police.

At the height of the siege, Mr Manca had offered himself as a substitute for one of the hostages who was taken ill and then released. Sir Robert also thanked the hostages and their relatives for their patience and fortitude, and also the press for their careful reporting of the situation.

Four days later The Spaghetti House re-opened for business. It later emerged the police had used a fibre-optic miniature camera squeezed through a hole in the cellar to monitor conditions inside. A psychiatrist, Dr Peter Scott, had advised on the mental state of those in the cellar. They had also worked with the news media to demoralise the gunmen by broadcasting radio reports saying there was no chance of them getting any concessions from the authorities.

One of the Italian hostages helped to break through the atmosphere of tension and mutual distrust and began a friendship with ringleader Franklin Davies. After the siege had ended he even visited him in prison in the weeks leading up the trial and was allowed not to testify against him. In June 1976 the trial opened in uproar when the three defendants refused to recognise the authority of the court, turned their backs on it and held up a defiant poster. They were sent back to cells for the duration of proceedings.

Davies was jailed for 22 years, Dick for 18 years and Munroe for 17 years for attempted robbery, having firearms with intent to rob and imprisoning eight hostages.

Davis campaigners stop Test match

Campaigners calling for the release of robber George Davis from prison have vandalised the pitch at Headingley cricket ground in Leeds. They dug holes in the pitch and poured oil over one end of the wicket. The walls surrounding the ground were also daubed with the now- familiar slogans demanding the release of Davis, the east London minicab driver jailed for his part in an armed robbery. The damaged pitch was discovered early on Tuesday by the head groundsman, George Cawthray.

Mr Cawthray said: "When I first saw the damage it did not sink in. I was amazed. I thought I should be able to repair the holes but it was the oil that did the damage."

The campaigners’ actions led to the final match between England and Australia on Tuesday being abandoned. It was declared a draw robbing England of the chance to win back the Ashes and the trophy.

‘Mistaken identity’

Detectives are searching for several men believed to have travelled from London to Leeds on Monday. Four police officers from Leeds have travelled to London to assist the Metropolitan police in their investigations

Davis, 34, who was sentenced to a 20-year term last year, is serving his sentence at Albany Prison on the Isle of Wight. His supporters say he was the victim of mistaken identity and did not take part in a payroll robbery in Ilford, Essex, when a police officer was shot and injured.

Since Davis’ imprisonment they have organised marches, petitions and fund-raising events to increase public awareness of his case.

In May two campaigners – Davis’ brothers-in-law Jim and Colin Dean – carried out a seven-hour roof-top protest at St Paul’s cathedral in London.

Four people were tried for digging up the pitch at Headingley. Three received suspended sentences but one, Peter Chappell, was jailed for 18 months. After the Headingley incident an internal inquiry was set up to investigation the Metropolitan police’s handling of George Davis’ case.

He was released in May 1976 after Home Secretary Roy Jenkins said there was serious doubt about his identification – which was based on the evidence of two police officers. However in July 1978 he was jailed for 15 years after pleading guilty to taking part in a bank robbery.

Davis was freed in 1984 but three years later he was sentenced to 18-months for attempting to steal mailbags.

Dozens killed in Moorgate Tube crash

A London Underground train crashed at Moorgate, killing the driver and at least 29 passengers and injuring more than 70 in the worst-ever Tube disaster.

The final death toll was 43. The cause of the crash remains a mystery.

The driver had been in good health and had not taken any alcohol or drugs, and was considered an unlikely suicide candidate.

He had worked for London Underground since 1969 and was known to be a careful, conscientious driver.

The guard, 18-year-old Robert Harris, admitted that he had not noticed the train getting faster as it pulled into the station.

Investigations carried out after the crash confirmed the brakes had not been applied and the driver had not even raised his hands to protect his face at the moment of impact. Nothing was wrong with the train, the signalling equipment or the track, nevertheless new safety measures were introduced after the tragedy.

1975 Timeline

6 January – Brian Clough, the former manager of Derby County and more recently Leeds United, was appointed manager of Football League Second Division strugglers Nottingham Forest.

14 January – Heiress Lesley Whittle (17), the daughter of late bus operator George Whittle (1905–1967), was kidnapped from her home near Bridgnorth in Shropshire by Donald Neilson.

24 January – Donald Coggan was enthroned as Archbishop of Canterbury.

6 February – Jensen, the luxury car maker, made 700 workers redundant – cutting its workforce by two thirds.

11 February – Margaret Thatcher defeated Edward Heath in the Conservative Party leadership election to become the party’s first female leader. Mrs Thatcher, 49, was Education Secretary in Mr Heath’s government from 1970 to 1974.

13 February – Britain’s coal miners accepted a 35% pay rise offer from the government.

The film Slade In Flame, starring the members of Slade, premieres at the Metropole Theatre in London.

26 February – A fleeing IRA member shot and killed an off-duty Metropolitan Police officer, Stephen Tibble, 22, as he gave chase.

28 February – A major tube train crash at Moorgate station, London, killed 43 people.

1 March – Aston Villa, chasing promotion from the Football League Second Division, won the Football League Cup with the only goal of the Wembley final against Norwich City being scored by Ray Graydon.

2 March – Los Angeles Police make a routine traffic stop that turns out to be Paul McCartney and his wife Linda. Linda is arrested for having 170 to 225 grams (six to eight ounces) of marijuana in her pocketbook.

4 March – Actor Charlie Chaplin, 85, was knighted by the Queen.

7 March – The body of teenage heiress Lesley Whittle, who disappeared from her Shropshire home in January, was discovered in Staffordshire. She had been strangled on a ledge in drains below Bathpool Park near Kidsgrove.

22 March – The Shadows represent the UK in the Eurovision Song Contest in Stockholm, Sweden. They come second.

25 March – A large National Front rally in London protested against European integration.

26 March – British Leyland released their new family saloon, the Morris 18-22 wedge styled by Harris Mann to replace the ageing Austin 1800 Landcrab range. There were Austin, Morris and the luxury Wolseley versions at launch, However, in less than six months the entire range was rebranded as the Princess and the marque Wolseley was consigned to history.

27 March – The film version of The Who’s Tommy premieres in London.

5 April – Manchester United clinched promotion back to the First Division one season after relegation.

7 April – Ritchie Blackmore plays a final show with Deep Purple in Paris before quitting to form his own group, Rainbow.

9 April – The comedy film Monty Python and the Holy Grail was released.

13 April – A 22-year-old woman was raped at her bedsit in Cambridge. Cambridgeshire Police believed that she was the sixth victim of a rapist who had been operating across the city since October last year. In June, Cambridgeshire Police arrested 47-year-old Peter Cook for the rapes; he was sentenced to life imprisonment in October.

24 April – Unemployment exceeded 1,000,000 for March 1975.

25 April – Pete Ham, founder of the group Badfinger, is found hanged in his London garage. His death is ruled a suicide.

26 April – A conference of Labour Party members voted against continued membership of the EEC.

Derby County won the Football League First Division title for the second time in four seasons.

May – Led Zeppelin returned to the UK to play five sold-out shows at Earls Court in London.

1 May – Vauxhall launched the Vauxhall Chevette, Britain’s first production small hatchback, which is similar in concept to the Italian Fiat 127 and French Renault 5.

2 May – The Rolling Stones announce their forthcoming North American tour by performing Brown Sugar from a flatbed truck on Fifth Avenue in New York City. The occasion was guitarist Ronnie Wood’s debut with the band.

3 May – West Ham United won the second FA Cup of their history by defeating Fulham 2-0 in the Wembley final. Alan Taylor scores both goals.

16 May – Major reorganisation of local government in Scotland under the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973.

27 May – Dibbles Bridge coach crash: a tour coach ran away following brake failure and falls off a bridge near Hebden, North Yorkshire, en route to Grassington, killing the driver and 31 women pensioners on board, the highest ever toll in a UK road accident.

28 May – Leeds United were beaten 2-0 by Bayern Munich of West Germany in the European Cup final in Paris, France. Peter Lorimer had a goal for Leeds disallowed and this sparked a riot by angry supporters, who invaded the pitch and tear seats away from the stands.

31 May – The European Space Agency was established with the UK being one of the ten founding members.

Jim’ll Fix It, presented by Jimmy Savile, is first shown on BBC1 television.

5 June – 67% of voters supported continued membership of the EEC in a referendum.

9 June – Proceedings in Parliament were broadcast on radio for the first time.

13 June – UEFA placed a three-year ban on Leeds United from European competitions for the actions of their fans at last month’s European Cup final.

14 June – Ambulance crews in the West Midlands staged a ban on non-emergency calls in a dispute over pay and hours.
17 June – Leeds United lodged an appeal against their ban from European competitions.

19 June – A coroner’s court jury returned a verdict of wilful murder, naming Lord Lucan as the murderer, in the inquest on Sandra Rivett, the nanny who was found dead at his wife’s London home seven months previously.

30 June – UEFA reduces Leeds United’s ban from European competitions to one season on appeal.

July – The Government and Trades Union Congress agreed a one-year cash limit on pay rises.

5 July – A 36-year-old Keighley woman Ann Rogulskyj was badly injured in a hammer attack in an alleyway in the West Yorkshire town.

1 August – The government’s anti-inflation policy came into full effect. During the year, inflation reached 24.2% – the second highest since records began in 1750 and the highest since 1800. A summary of the White Paper Attack on Inflation is delivered to all households.

4 August – Robert Plant and his wife Maureen are seriously injured in a car accident while vacationing on the Greek island of Rhodes. The immediate future of Led Zeppelin is cast into doubt, as Plant will not recover for quite some time.

14 August – Hampstead entered the UK Weather Records with the Highest 155-min total rainfall at 169 mm.

15 August – A 46-year-old Halifax woman Olive Smelt was severely injured in a hammer attack in an alleyway in the town.

16 August – Football hooliganism struck on the opening day of the English league season, with hundreds of fans being arrested at games across the country – the total number of arrests exceeded seventy at the stadiums of Wolverhampton Wanderers and Leicester City.

19 August – Headingley cricket ground was vandalised by people campaigning for release from prison of the armed robber George Davis. A scheduled test match between England and Australia due to take place there had to be abandoned. This was the climax to a campaign in which the slogan George Davis is Innocent was widely sprayed throughout London.

21 August – 1.25 million are jobless.

23 August – Peter Gabriel leaves progressive rock group Genesis.

27 August – A 14-year-old, Tracy Browne, was badly injured in a hammer attack in a country lane at Silsden, near Keighley.

31 August – Cavalcade of steam locomotives at Shildon, County Durham, to mark the 150th anniversary of the Stockton and Darlington Railway.

September – Chrysler UK launched its new Alpine five-door family hatchback, a modern front-wheel drive car to compete with the conventional Ford Cortina, Morris Marina and upcoming Vauxhall Cavalier rear-wheel drive saloons. The new car was also built in France as the Simca 1307.

5 September – The London Hilton hotel was bombed by the IRA killing two people and injuring 63 others.

19 September – The first episode of the popular sitcom Fawlty Towers was broadcast on BBC2 television.

24 September – Dougal Haston and Doug Scott became the first British people to climb Mount Everest.

27 September – The National Railway Museum was opened in York, becoming the first national museum outside London.

28 September – 3 October – The Spaghetti House siege, in which nine people were taken as hostages, took place in London.

October – Vauxhall announced its second new model launch of the year – the Cavalier, which replaced the Victor, was based on the German Opel Ascona, and was a direct competitor for the big-selling Ford Cortina.

Statistics show that Britain is now in a double-dip recession, as the economy contracted for the second and third quarters of this year.

3 October – The Who release their seventh studio album The Who By Numbers.

7 October – John Lennon finally wins his battle to stay in the United States after the New York Court of Appeals overturns Lennon’s 1972 deportation order.

8 October – John Lennon and Yoko Ono become parents of Sean Ono Lennon at 2:00 AM. The birth heralds the beginning of John’s temporary retirement from the music business as he vows to devote himself to family for the next five years.

9 October – An IRA bomb explosion outside Green Park tube station near Piccadilly in London killed one and injured 20.

13 October – Norton Villiers, the Wolverhampton based motorcycle producer, closed down with the loss of 1,600 jobs after being declared bankrupt.

30 October – West Yorkshire Police launched a murder investigation after 28-year-old prostitute Wilma McCann was found dead in Leeds.

31 October – Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody was released. It goes to No.1 for 9 weeks and as of 2012 is the biggest-selling non-Charity single in UK history.

3 November – A petroleum pipeline from Cruden Bay to Grangemouth across Scotland is formally opened by The Queen.

6 November – The first public performance by punk rock band the Sex Pistols took place at St. Martin’s School of Art in London.

12 November – The Employment Protection Act established ACAS to arbitrate industrial disputes, and legislated against unfair dismissal.

16 November – British and Icelandic ships clashed, marking the beginning of the third Cod War.

27 November – Ross McWhirter, co-founder with his twin of the Guinness Book of Records, was shot dead by the Provisional Irish Republican Army for offering reward money to informers.

29 November – Former racing driver Graham Hill, 46, died in an air crash in Hertfordshire.

December – Donald Neilson, 39, was arrested in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, on suspicion of being the "Black Panther" murderer who was believed to have carried out five murders in the last two years.

5 December – Government ends Internment of suspected terrorists in Northern Ireland.

6 – 12 December – Balcombe Street Siege: IRA members on the run from police broke into a London flat taking the residents hostage. The siege ended after six days with the gunmen giving themselves up to the police.

18 December – The official break-up of Faces is announced at a London press conference. Rod Stewart will continue his solo career while Ronnie Wood joins The Rolling Stones.

25 December – Iron Maiden is formed, in Leyton, east London, by bassist Steve Harris.

29 December – Two new laws, the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 and the Equal Pay Act 1970, came into force aiming to end unequal pay of men and women in the workplace.

The Willis Building (Ipswich) was completed, a key early example of Foster Associates’ ‘high-tech’ architectural style.

The British National Oil Corporation was set up.

First annual payment of Short Money made to the Official Opposition in the House of Commons to help with its costs for Parliamentary business (named after Edward Short, Leader of the House).

Jackie Tabick became the first female rabbi in Britain.

The white-tailed sea eagle was reintroduced to the UK, on the Isle of Rum.

Television

UK TV Adverts 1975
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO0tZVQzlOw

2 January – The Sweeney premieres on ITV.

22 January – 26 February – Drama series The Love School, about the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood is shown on BBC2.

1 April – Premier of Edward the Seventh, a TV drama series, made by ATV in 13 one-hour episodes, and based on the biography of Edward VII by Philip Magnus.

3 April – Meg Richardson (Noele Gordon) married Hugh Mortimer (John Bentley) on the soap opera Crossroads.

4 April – The Good Life premieres on BBC1.

31 May – Jim’ll Fix It makes its debut on BBC1.

19 September – The comedy series Fawlty Towers debuts on BBC2.

25 September – Yorkshire Television premieres Animal Kwackers, the British Version of The American Television Series "The Banana Splits Adventure Hour", but shorter and a lot different than the American Version.

28 October – A James Bond film is shown on British television for the first time, Dr. No on ITV.

9 December – 15th anniversary of the first episode of Coronation Street.

17 December – The Thames Television film The Naked Civil Servant, based on Quentin Crisp’s memoirs is aired on British television. The film stars John Hurt in the leading role.

BBC 1

5 January – Paddington (1975–1986)
4 April – The Good Life (1975–1978)
16 April – Survivors (1975–1977)
31 May – Jim’ll Fix It (1975–1994)
1 September – Angels (1975–1983)

BBC 2

12 May – Rutland Weekend Television (1975–1976)
19 September – Fawlty Towers (1975, 1979)
1 October – Arena (1975–present)

ITV

2 January – The Sweeney (1975–1978)
1 April – Edward the Seventh (1975)
20 July – Celebrity Squares (1975–1979, 1993–1997, 2014–present)
6 September – Space: 1999 (1975–1978)
9 September – Shades of Greene (1975–1976)
27 October – The Cuckoo Waltz (1975–1980)

Number Ones Singles UK

"Lonely This Christmas" – Mud
"Down Down" – Status Quo
"Ms Grace" – The Tymes
"January" – Pilot
"Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)" – Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel
"If" – Telly Savalas
"Bye Bye Baby" – Bay City Rollers
"Oh Boy!" – Mud
"Stand By Your Man" – Tammy Wynette
"Whispering Grass" – Don Estelle & Windsor Davies
"I’m Not in Love" – 10cc
"Tears On My Pillow" – Johnny Nash
"Give a Little Love" – Bay City Rollers
"Barbados" – Typically Tropical
"I Can’t Give You Anything (But My Love)" – The Stylistics
"Sailing" – Rod Stewart
"Hold Me Close" – David Essex
"I Only Have Eyes for You" – Art Garfunkel
"Space Oddity" – David Bowie
"D.I.V.O.R.C.E." – Billy Connolly
"Bohemian Rhapsody" – Queen

Albums

Greatest Hits – Elton John
His Greatest Hits – Engelbert Humperdinck
On the Level – Status Quo
Physical Graffiti – Led Zeppelin
20 Greatest Hits – Tom Jones
The Best of the Stylistics – The Stylistics
Once Upon a Star – Bay City Rollers
Venus and Mars – Wings
Horizon – The Carpenters
Wish You Were Here – Pink Floyd
Atlantic Crossing – Rod Stewart
40 Golden Greats – Jim Reeves
We All Had Doctors’ Papers – Max Boyce
40 Greatest Hits – Perry Como
A Night at the Opera – Queen

1975 Sunday July 13th – Rollermania in Bristol

Hitched-up baggy trousers, basketball boots, tartan scarves, police, shrieking girls and near riots . . . you’ve guessed it. Rollermania was in town. It came three times to Bristol in the summer of ’75. There was the day they opened the box office at the Colston Hall for the forthcoming Bay City Rollers show. Then there was the dress rehearsal on May 29th when the band should have appeared but didn’t. And then there was the real thing when the squeaky-clean popsters finally made it to Bristol and brought the house down.