Obviously, Star Wars was the movie of the year that I did not see. However, I did see a number of other movies that I liked. Number one was Annie Hall, with Diane Keaton as Annie Hall and Woody Allen as Aly Singer, a divorced Jewish comedian, reflecting on his relationship with his ex-lover Annie Hall, an aspiring nightclub singer, which ended abruptly just like his previous marriages. I liked the interplay of their relationships. I loved the John Travolta film Saturday Night Fever. This really introduced Disco music into the main culture and at the same time it made John Travolta a classic movie star. The opening scene with Travolta (Vinny), the hardware store worker walking down the street with the Bee Gees singing “Staying Alive” is a classic. Gene Siskel, the Chicago film critic, bought the white sports coat from the disco dancing scenes because he liked the movie so much. Another science fiction movie that I liked was Close Encounters of the Third Kind, directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Richard Dreyfuss, who I liked. I also liked Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave in Julia, about two friends in Nazi Germany. I liked another movie with Richard Dreyfuss and Marsha Mason in The Goodbye Girl. Then there was the ballerina movie with Shirley MacLaine, Anne Bancroft, Mikhail Baryshnikov, and Leslie Browne in The Turning Point. I got introduced to ballet. I really liked Robert De Niro and Liza Minnelli in New York, New York, about a young couple in New York City after World War II. I think I saw parts of Arnold Schwarzenegger in Pumping Iron later on TV. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferrigno faced off in a no-holds-barred competition for the title of Mr. Olympia. I also loved Sally Field, Burt Reynolds, and Jackie Gleason in Smokey and the Bandit. It was just good old-fashioned fun with those three, bur I never saw any of the sequels. I also saw Paul Newman in Slap Shot. I think I saw Richard Burton and Peter Firth in Equus, about a psychiatrist and a young boy’s obsession with horses. I also saw A Bridge Too Far, about World War II in the Netherlands with Sean Connery, Ryan O’Neal, and Michael Caine. Of course, one of my favorites was Oh, God! George Burns as God appeared to John Denver, who was an assistant grocery manager as a good-natured old man, to be his messenger for the modern world, directed by Carl Reiner. Thus, I enjoyed a lot of good movies in 1977, and none of them were Star Wars. I did not see some other movies from 1977 like Bad News Bears, Airport 77, Billy Jack Goes to Washington, Demon Seed, Exorcist II, Casanova, For the Love of Benji, Fun with Dick and Jane, The Gauntlet, Grand Theft Auto, Greased Lightning, The Greatest, Heroes, High Anxiety, The Hills Have Eyes, I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, Islands in the Stream, The Late Show, A Little Night Music, Looking for Mr. Goodbar, MacArthur, Pete’s Dragon, Raid on Entebbe, Scott Joplin, Semi-Tough, and You Light Up My Life. There were a lot of movies in 1977. What is your favorite movie of 1977?
Sports in 1977
A. J. Foyt became the first driver to win the Indianapolis 500 four times. Seattle Slew won the triple crown of horse racing. Britain’s Virginia Wade won the centennial Wimbledon tennis title, the last time a British woman won at Wimbledon. Pele played his final professional football soccer game, as a member of the New York Cosmos at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Adolph Rupp (1901-1977), the great Kentucky college basketball coach, died at the age of 76. In the Super Bowl, Al Davis’s Oakland Raiders with Coach John Madden, Quarterback Kenny Stabler, and Wide Receiver MVP Fred Biletnikoff dominated the Minnesota Vikings, with Coach Bud Grant and Quarterback Fran Tarkenton, 32−14 at the Rose Bowl in LA before 103,438 people. During the regular season, Eddie Brown of the Washington Redskins set an NFL record for punt returns in a game with 11. I remember Walter Payton of the Chicago Bears setting a new single-game NFL rushing record, gaining 275 yards in a 10–7 victory over the Minnesota Vikings. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers won their first ever game over the New Orleans Saints, ending their NFL record 26-game losing streak. In college football, the Pittsburgh Panthers won 27–3 over the Georgia Bulldogs to win the college football national championship in the Sugar Bowl. In the Baseball World Series, the New York Yankees, with manager Billy Martin, defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers, with manager Tony Lasorda, 4-2, as MVP Reggie Jackson became known as “Mr. October.” Ernie Banks, one of my boyhood favorites, was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. The Yankees Sparky Lyle broke Ron Perranoski’s major league record for left-handers with 179 career saves. Two American League MLB expansion teams, the Seattle Mariners, and the Toronto Blue Jays, made their debuts. In the Basketball NCAA championship, Al McGuire’s Marquette University beat Dean Smith’s North Carolina University 67–59, led by Butch Lee who had nearly led Puerto Rico to a victory in the 1976 Montreal Olympics that I saw in person. I remember Al McGuire (1928-2001) crying after this victory since he had announced that he was going to retire after this final game, after 13 years as coach at Marquette, to become a basketball announcer. In the NBA Finals, the Portland Trail Blazers defeated the Philadelphia 76ers, 4 games to 2 for their first and only NBA title. Bill Walton was the leader and MVP of the Portland Trailblazers against the 76ers Doug Collins, Julius Erving, and George McGinnis. In golf, Tom Watson was the leading money winner with $310,653, as he won both the Master’s and the British Open, while Hubbie Green won the US Open and Lanny Wadkins the PGA. Judy Rankin was LPGA leader with $122,890. Guy Lafleur of the Montreal Canadiens was the leading NHL scorer and MVP as the Canadiens beat the Boston Bruins 4-0 to win the Stanley Cup in Ice hockey. The AP Female Athlete of the Year was Chris Evert, the winner of the US Open in tennis, a distant cousin of Margaret. AP Male Athlete of the Year was Steve Cauthen, the first jockey to earn over $6,000,000. What do you remember about sports in 1977?
Significant deaths in 1977
Besides Elvis Presley (1944-1977), Anthony Eden, a British politician, 62nd Prime Minister of the United Kingdom died (1897-1977), as well as Peter Finch, an English-born actor (1916-1977), and Gary Gilmore, an American murderer (1940-1977) and Pascual Pérez, an Argentine world Flyweight boxing champion (1926-1977). Dietrich von Hildebrand, a German philosopher, and theologian (1889-1977) as well as a young Freddie Prinze, an American actor and comedian (1954-1977) died. Brett Halliday, an American writer (1904-1977), John Dickson Carr, an American crime novelist (1906-1977), as well as Fannie Lou Hamer, an American civil rights activist (1917-1977) died. The American actors Andy Devine (1905-1977), Allison Hayes (1930-1977), and Henry Hull (1890-1977) all died. Some of my favorites as a kid died, Groucho Marx, an American actor and comedian (1890-1977), Bing Crosby, an American pop singer and actor (1903-1977), Guy Lombardo, Canadian-American bandleader (1902-1977), Joan Crawford, American actress (1904-1977), Sir Charlie Chaplin, British actor, producer, and director (1889-1977), and Antonino Rocca, an Italian professional wrestler (1921-1977). Ludwig Erhard, 28th Chancellor of West Germany (1897-1977) died. Others who died in 1977 include: Diana Hyland, an American actress (1936-1977), Karl Ritter, a German film producer and director (1888-1977), Jacques Prévert, French poet and screenwriter (1900-1977), William Conway, Northern Irish cardinal (1913-1977), Bryan Foy, American film producer and director (1896-1977), Stanley Adams, American actor (1915-1977), Clementine Churchill, wife of Winston Churchill (1885-1977), Ernst Bloch, German Marxist philosopher (1885-1977), Roberto Rossellini, Italian film director (1906-1977), Charles Alston, American artist and sculptor (1907-1977), Ricardo Cortez, American actor (1899-1977), James Jones, American writer (1921-1977), William Castle, American film director (1914-1977), Stephen Boyd, Northern Irish actor (1931-1977), Alan Reed, American actor (1907-1977), Wernher von Braun, German and American rocket scientist (1912-1977), Marston Morse, American mathematician (1892-1977), Paul Hartmann, American actor (1889-1977), Alice Paul, American women’s rights activist (1885-1977), Carter DeHaven, American actor (1886-1977), Prince Charles of Luxembourg, Prince of Luxembourg (1927-1977), Francis Gary Powers, American U-2 spy plane pilot (1929-1977), Alfred Lunt, American actor (1892-1977), Delmer Daves, American screenwriter and director (1904-1977), Sebastian Cabot, English actor (1918-1977), Jean Hagen, American actress (1923-1977), Ethel Waters, American singer and actress (1896-1977), E. F. Schumacher, German statistician and economist (1885-1977), Zero Mostel, American actor (1915-1977), Steve Biko, South African anti-apartheid activist (1946-1977), Maria Callas, Greek soprano (1923-1977), Dorothy Davenport, American actress (1895-1977), James M. Cain, American writer (1892-1977), Betty Balfour, English screen actress (1902-1977), Gertrude Astor, American actress (1887-1977), Dennis Wheatley, English writer (1897-1977) Princess Charlotte of Monaco (1898-1977), Richard Carlson, American actor (1912-1977), Olga Petrova, English-born American actress (1884-1977), and Howard Hawks, American film director (1896-1977). Do you know anyone that died in 1977?
Disasters in 1977
An earthquake in Romania and the Balkans killed 1,578 people. An earthquake in the Vrancea Mountains of Romania killed over 1,500 people. A Tangol earthquake rocked Iran, killing at least 584 people, and injuring 1,000. Two Boeing 747 passenger jets collided on the runway at Los Rodeos Airport, killing 583 on the Spanish Canary Island of Tenerife. the deadliest accident in aviation history. Southern Airways Flight 242 crashed on a highway in New Hope, Georgia, killing 72 people. Aeroflot Ilyushin 62 airplane crashed in Cuba killing 69 people. A chartered Douglas DC-3 aircraft carrying the University of Evansville basketball team to Nashville, Tennessee, crashed about 90 seconds after takeoff from Evansville Regional Airport with 29 people dead, including 14 members of the team and the head coach Bob Watson. SA de Transport Aérien Flight 730, an international charter service from Zurich to Funchal Airport (Madeira), hit the sea during a landing attempt, as 36 people drowned. The worst storm in Athens’ modern history caused havoc across the Greek capital and killed 38 people. The Kelly Barnes Dam, located above Toccoa Falls Bible College near Toccoa, Georgia, United States, failed and killed 39 people. Three bombs exploded in Moscow within 37 minutes, killing 7. The Yugoslavia Prime minister Džemal Bijedić, his wife, and 6 others were killed in a plane crash in Bosnia and Herzegovina. An Ejército del Aire CASA C-207C Azor plane crashed into the side of a mountain near Chiva, on approach to Valencia Airport in Spain, killing all 11 people on board. The 1977 IAS Cargo Boeing 707 airplane crashed in Lusaka, Zambia killing all 6 on board. A 20-passenger S-61L toppled sideways at takeoff from the roof of the Pan Am Building in Midtown Manhattan. 4 passengers were killed by the turning rotors and a woman at street level was killed by a falling blade. Malaysian Airline System Flight 653 was hijacked and crashed in Tanjung Kupang, Johor, Malaysia, killing all 100 passengers and crew on board. The Indian Andhra Pradesh cyclone killed 10,000 people. In northern Bangladesh, a cyclone killed 13 people and injured about 100 others. 49 marines from the USS Trenton and USS Guam were killed because of a collision in Barcelona, Spain. Australia’s worst railway disaster at Granville, a suburb of Sydney, left 83 people dead. In northern Japan, a blizzard piled snow on rooftops, causing many to collapse, killing at least 31 people. The Xinjiang 61st Regiment Farm fire started during Chinese New Year when a firecracker ignited, killing 694 people, mostly children, the deadliest fire in China. The Beverly Hills Supper Club in Southgate, Kentucky, was engulfed in fire that killed 165 people inside. TAP Portugal Flight 425 crashed at Madeira Airport, Funchal, Portugal, killing 131 and leaving 33 survivors. Does it seem like there were a number of airplane crashes in 1977?
Big events in 1977
In 1977, Atari released Atari 2600. Apple also released its successful microcomputer Apple II for sale. Scientists reported using bacteria in a lab to make insulin via gene splicing. Scientists also identified a previously unknown bacterium as the cause of the mysterious Legionnaires’ disease. The WHO and the CDC considered the last natural smallpox case in Somalia as the eradication of smallpox to be a a great success of worldwide vaccinations. The rings of Uranus were discovered. 2060 Chiron, first of the outer Solar System asteroids known as Centaurs, was discovered by Charlie Kowal. The TCP/IP test succeeded in connecting 3 ARPANET nodes, in what eventually became the Internet protocol. Amnesty International won the Noble Peace Prize. The Big Ear, a radio telescope operated by Ohio State University received a radio signal from deep space, known as the Wow Signal. Optical fiber was first used to carry live telephone traffic at an Italian company in Turin. The Porsche 928 debuted at the Geneva Motor Show. The Constitution for the Federation of Earth, also known as the Earth Constitution, was adopted by the second session of the World Constituent Assembly, held at Innsbruck, Austria. USA Voyager 1 and 2 were launched. The European Patent Institute was founded. The Greek archaeologist Manolis Andronikos discovered the tomb of Philip II of Macedon at Vergina. British Airways inaugurated regular London to New York City supersonic Concorde service. The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) was founded as a specialized agency of the United Nations. The Colombo Plan for Co-operative Economic and Social Development in Asia and the Pacific (CESDAP) was implemented. The Cold War between Cambodia and Vietnam evolved into the Cambodian–Vietnamese War. Somalia declared war on Ethiopia, starting the Ethio-Somali War. New York City was affected by a complete electricity blackout lasting through the following day that resulted in citywide looting and other criminal activity, including arson. The National Assembly of Quebec passed the Charter of the French Language making French the official language of the Canadian province of Quebec. In a treaty between Panama and the United States the US agreed to transfer control of the Panama Canal to Panama at the end of the 20th century. U.S. President Jimmy Carter signed legislation creating the United States Department of Energy as the Energy Research and Development Administration combined with the Federal Energy Administration. Egyptian Anwar Sadat met with Menachem Begin in Israel, as the first Arab leader to seek a peace treaty. San Francisco elected City Supervisor Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official of any large city in the U.S. Vietnam joined the United Nations. What do you remember about 1977?
President US Grant (1822-1885) and Galena, Illinois
Ulysses S. Grant was an American military officer and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. As commanding general, Grant led the Union Army to victory in the American Civil War in 1865 and briefly served as U.S. Secretary of War. President Grant signed a bill to create the Justice Department and worked with Republicans to protect African Americans during Reconstruction. Grant was born in Ohio, and graduated from West Point in 1843. He served with distinction in the Mexican–American War, but resigned from the army in 1854. In April 1860, Grant and his family moved north to Galena, accepting a position in his father’s leather goods business. The Ulysses S. Grant Home in Galena, Illinois, is the former home of Ulysses S. Grant, designed by William Dennison and constructed in 1859. Grant and his family lived there during his 1868 presidential campaign and again for a few periods during his presidency and retirement. He last visited the home in 1880. Since 1904, it has been maintained as a memorial to Grant, but is owned by the state of Illinois as a historic house museum landmark. In 1861, shortly after the Civil War began, Grant joined the Union Army and rose to prominence after securing Union victories in the western theater. In 1863, he led the Vicksburg campaign that gave Union forces control of the Mississippi River and dealt a major strategic blow to the Confederacy. President Abraham Lincoln promoted Grant to lieutenant general after his victory at Chattanooga. For thirteen months, Grant fought Robert E. Lee during the high-casualty Overland Campaign which ended with the capture of Lee’s army at Appomattox, where Lee formally surrendered to Grant. In 1866, President Andrew Johnson promoted Grant to General of the Army. Later, Grant broke with Johnson over Reconstruction policies. A war hero, drawn in by his sense of duty, Grant was unanimously nominated by the Republican Party and then elected president in 1868. As president, Grant stabilized the post-war national economy, supported congressional Reconstruction and the Fifteenth Amendment, and prosecuted the Ku Klux Klan. Under Grant, the Union was completely restored, as he appointed African Americans and Jewish Americans to prominent federal offices. In 1871, he created the first Civil Service Commission, advancing the civil service more than any prior president. Grant was re-elected in the 1872 presidential election, but was inundated by executive scandals during his second term. His response to the Panic of 1873 was ineffective in halting the Long Depression, which contributed to the Democrats winning the House majority in 1874. Grant’s Native American policy was to assimilate Indians into Anglo-American culture. Leaving office in 1877, Grant undertook a world tour, meeting prominent figures and becoming the first president to circumnavigate the world. In 1880, he was unsuccessful in obtaining the Republican nomination for a third term. In 1885, facing severe financial reversals and dying of throat cancer, Grant wrote his memoirs, covering his life through the Civil War, which were posthumously published and became a major critical and financial success. At his death, Grant was the most popular American, memorialized as a symbol of national unity. Attendance at his New York funeral topped 1.5 million. Thus, there is Grant’s tomb in New York City and Grant Park in downtown Chicago. Due to the Lost Cause myth spread by Confederate sympathizers around the turn of the 20th century, historical assessments and rankings of Grant’s presidency suffered considerably before recovering in the 21st century. Modern scholarship has better appreciated Grant’s appointments of Cabinet reformers. What do you know about President US Grant?
Traveling northern Illinois
I do not know if it was the same time or another time, that we went to Dubuque that we stopped along the way. I know that we took US 90 past Belvidere to Rockford and then we took Route 20 past Freeport and Stockton. We stopped in Apple River Canyon State Park, where there was the Charles Mound, the highest point in Illinois at 1,241 feet. Then it was on to Galena, to visit the home of President Ulysses S. Grant. On the way back we went to the Mississippi Palisades State Park just outside Savannah, Illinois. This reminded me of the New Jersey State Palisades Park that overlooks the Hudson River near New York City. Further on Route 64, we stopped at the White Pines Forest State Park with its white pine trees, the only place in Illinois that they grow. Finally, we drove past Oregon, Illinois, and back home to Matteson. What do you know about northern Illinois?
Dubuque, Iowa
We visited the 30 square mile city of Dubuque in the late 1970s, the county seat, of Dubuque County, Iowa, located along the Mississippi River with a population of just under 60,000 people. Another 30,000 people live in the rest of Dubuque County. Dubuque lies at the junction of Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin, as the main commercial, industrial, educational, and cultural center for this area. Thus, Dubuque is a regional tourist destination, about 180 miles west of Chicago. Dubuque has historically been a center of manufacturing, health care, publishing, and financial service sectors. The first permanent European settler was Quebecois pioneer Julien Dubuque, who arrived in 1785, so that the city was named after him in 1833. This region was designated as the Iowa Territory in 1838, until it became the State of Iowa in 1846. Between 1860 and 1880, Dubuque was one of the 100 largest urban areas in the United States. Beginning in the mid-19th century and into the early 20th century, thousands of German and Irish Catholic immigrants came to the city to work in the manufacturing centers. Thus, the sections of the city still have the remains of German and Irish culture. This city’s large Roman Catholic congregations led to its designation as the seat of the newly established Archdiocese of Dubuque in 1873. Local Catholic settlers established what would become the first Christian church in Iowa, St. Raphael’s Cathedral, in 1833. The city also played a key role in the expansion of the Catholic Church, as it was the administrative center for Catholics in Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota. Dubuque grew significantly, as industrial activity remained its economic mainstay until the 1980s. Tommy John, who pitched for the Dubuque Packers in 1961, recalled that the town was “about 98% Catholic” back then. In 2022, it maintained its strong Catholic presence as Ben Jacobs of The New Republic described it as “One of the most Catholic areas in the United States.” Dubuque was the epitome of small-town Catholic life. There are 52 different churches in Dubuque, home to three theological seminaries. A series of changes in manufacturing and the onset of the farm crisis in the 1980s led to a large decline in the city’s economy. Since the 1990s, tourism, technology, and publishing are now the largest and fastest-growing businesses. Dubuque attracts over 2 million tourists annually. The 1978 film F.I.S.T with Sylvester Stallone was filmed there. Dubuque’s West End is a large, mostly suburban area settled almost entirely after the Second World War. Expansion began with the construction of the John Deere Homes, financed by Deere & Company for its workers. Soon after, many large shopping centers were built, including Plaza 20, and the then-largest enclosed shopping mall in Iowa, Kennedy Mall. Dubuque is 85% White, 6% Black, and 4% Hispanic or Latino. The people in Dubuque have been mostly Democratic. At times, Dubuque was called “The State of Dubuque” because the political climate in Dubuque was very different from the rest of Iowa. Dubuque is home to several higher education institutions. Loras College and Clarke University are two four-year colleges operated by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Dubuque. Protestant colleges in the city include the University of Dubuque, which is associated with the Presbyterian Church, and Emmaus Bible College, connected with the Plymouth Brethren movement. Other post-secondary schools in the area include Northeast Iowa Community College. Have you ever been to Dubuque?
We celebrated our fall wedding anniversary in Dubuque Iowa
I am not sure whether it was our fifth, sixth, or seventh wedding anniversary, but either in October 1976, 1977, 1978, around Columbus Day, we went for a weekend in Dubuque, Iowa. I have the information about this weekend in a scrapbook right after the trip to Europe in 1977, “The Holiday Inn Fall Color Cruise.” We stayed at the Holiday Inn at 1111 Dodge St, in Dubuque, Iowa, that today is a Days Inn. The total package for two was $50.00. This included the stay plus a cruise on the Mississippi River on the “Spirit of Dubuque,” a sumptuous dinner for two at the Roberts Smorgastable in downtown Dubuque, cocktails for two at the Holiday Inn Crows Nest Entertainment Lounge, a ride on the historic fourth street cable car, the world’s shortest and steepest cable car, and a tour of the Five Flags Theatre. That seemed pretty good to me. I do not remember the hotel that well. However, I do remember the two-hour cruise on the Double Deck Mississippi River Paddle-wheeler that held about 350 people. We went north, seeing the rocky bluffs of Illinois on the east and downtown Dubuque on the west. Then there was Eagle Point Park with trees in their various colors. It was kind of nice to be on the Mississippi River in the fall as the trees turned their various shades of green, yellow, and red. The ride on the old 1884 cable car was memorable for its short ride on a 65-degree angle. From the top there was a panoramic view of the city and the mighty Mississippi. I do not remember much about the other stuff. Dubuque is about three to four hours west of Chicago. I have about three or four postcards of Dubuque plus a tourist guide. Have you ever been on the Mississippi River?
First day of school in the fall of 1977
It became a tradition at our house in Matteson that the first day of school was a big day. Joy would stand outside the front door of our house on Allemong or on the first step down and have her picture taken. Thus, in the fall of 1977, Joy had her picture taken as she prepared to go to Raygor pre-school. There would be many more pictures like that over the years. She was going to begin her academic career as a young student. On top of that, Margaret was off to her first full year of teaching at St. Lawrence O’Toole. This would become a tradition for her also, for the next thirty years. Fall was the time to get ready for school. For me, there was no more school, but back to Montgomery Ward. Do you remember the first day of school?
Gene Finnegan Remembers Living Eighty Wonderful Years 