Eastern Airlines Flight 984 was scheduled to departGuatemala City forMiami at 3:30 pm, but mechanical problems delayed the takeoff. As baggage was being prepared for loading on the Boeing 727, a time bomb exploded inside one of the suitcases at 4:15, when the jet would have been in flight over the Caribbean.[5]
Four bodies were found in a home at 8763 Wonderland Avenue in the hills aboveLos Angeles, along with a seriously injured woman. All five had been bludgeoned with a steel pipe. Neighbors had heard screams earlier in the morning, but nobody called the police until 12 hours later.[7] Pornographic movie starJohn Holmes and nightclub ownerEddie Nash were both indicted for the killings; both were acquitted.[8]
TheUnited States Supreme Court ruled unanimously that then-PresidentJimmy Carter had acted within his authority in ending theIran hostage crisis when he agreed in theAlgiers Accords to release frozen Iranian assets no later than July 19, in return for the release of 52 American hostages fromIran. The decision, made only 8 days after the Court heard arguments, cleared the way for $2.3 billion to be transferred from U.S. banks to Iran. Earlier on the same day, eight of the former hostages sued Iran in federal court, seeking $5,000,000 apiece, despite a waiver of the right to sue as part of the same accords.[9]
The New York Times became the first major newspaper to report on the existence ofAIDS, with a report on page 20, headlined "Rare Cancer Seen in 41 Homosexuals". Initially referred to as "GRID" (for "Gay Related Immune Disorder"), the illness would later be namedAcquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.[12][13] The news, picked up byCNN the next day, was based on an article in theMorbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, entitled "Kaposi's Sarcoma andPneumocystis Pneumonia Among Homosexual Men- New York City and California".[14]
Chen Wen-chen, 31, an assistant mathematics professor in the United States atCarnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, was killed by security police during a vacation in his homeland inTaiwan.[16]
Kenji Urada, an employee at the automatedKawasaki Heavy Industries factory, became what was reported as the first person to be killed by a robot.[17] However, an American worker,Robert Williams of the Ford Motor Company plant in Flat Rock, Michigan, had been killed by a robot two years earlier, on January 25, 1979.[18]
After initial doubts about whether hisLikud party had been defeated by the Labor Party ofShimon Peres, Prime MinisterMenachem Begin was able to declare victory inthe closest election in the history of Israel. Under theIsraeli system of government, representation in Parliament was based upon the proportion of the overall balloting. With 718,941 votes, Likud had 37.1% for 48 seats, while the 708,356 for Labour was 36.6% for 47 seats, giving Begin the right to assemble the coalition in the 120-seat Knesset.[20][21]
Rajan Mahadevan recitedpi to 31,811 digits before an audience inMangalore. The event took 3 hours and 49 minutes, including a total of 26 minutes of breaks, and was sponsored by the local Lions Club International, Lion Seva Mandir.[22] The record would stand until 1987, when Hideaki Tomoyoni repeated the first 40,000 digits.[23]
On trial in Los Angeles under accusation of being theHillside Strangler,Kenneth Bianchi took the witness stand in his own defense. After initially denying his involvement in the slayings of ten young women, Bianchi unexpectedly began a detailed confession and calmly described each of the murders in detail.[24][25]
"I'm pleased to announce that upon completion of all the necessary checks by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, I will send to the Senate the nomination of JudgeSandra Day O'Connor of the Arizona Court of Appeals for confirmation as an Associate Justice of theUnited States Supreme Court." With those words, U.S. PresidentRonald Reagan named O'Connor as the 102nd person, and first woman, to ever serve on the Supreme Court of the United States.[28]
Died:Peace Pilgrim (Mildred Norman), 72, American pacifist who attracted attention to her causes by walking across the United States; in an auto accident nearKnox, Indiana
Lt.Adriano Bomba ofMozambique flew a Soviet-builtMiG-17 jet fighter intoSouth Africa and then signaled to intercepting forces that he wished to surrender. Bomba, a black African defector, was given asylum by the white minority government that ruled the nation during the apartheid era, in return for military intelligence.[29]
During anarson attack on a bus depot inBelfast inNorthern Ireland, 16-year-oldCatholic John Dempsey became the first of two teenagers in two days to be killed byBritish Army snipers. The next day, Danny Barrett, 15, was killed by a British soldier.[30]
TheIsrael Defense Forces began a regular bombardment ofPalestine Liberation Organization strongholds inLebanon. The siege escalated after the Palestinian guerillas began shelling Israeli settlements. Until a July 24 ceasefire, 450 Palestinians and Lebanese, and 6 Israelis, died.[33]
Ken Rex McElroy was murdered inSkidmore, Missouri by several unknown gunmen as a group of 60 people, frustrated with McElroy's continued violations of the law, gathered. The example of vigilante justice would later be recounted in books anda made-for-TV movie.[34][35]
Three days of torrential rains began inChina'sSichuan Province, with up to 18.8 inches (480 mm) raising the level of theYangtze River and its tributaries as much as 16.5 feet (5.0 m). Initial reports from theXinhua news agency reported 3,000 deaths and 100,000 injuries.[39] The official numbers would be revised two weeks later, but the toll was still high, with 753 dead, 558 missing, 28,140 injured and 1.5 million people left homeless.[40]
Troopers Merle J. Cook and Robert L. Pruitt and Corporal Cleo L. Tomlinson, Jr., of theFlorida Highway Patrol died on duty in an aircraft accident while searching for twoburglary suspects.[42][43][44]
Max Hugel, a millionaire who had been appointed byCIA DirectorWilliam Casey to serve as Deputy Director for Clandestine Operations despite having "no visible qualifications",[45] resigned hours afterThe Washington Post broke a story headlined, "Spymaster Is Accused of Improper Stock Practices".[46][47]
Aspartame, the artificial sweetener marketed asNutraSweet, was approved for sale in the United States by theFood and Drug Administration. Initially, the product was cleared only for use at home, but would later be approved as a food additive.[48]
Died:Harry Chapin, 38, folk singer and hunger activist, was killed in a car wreck nearJericho, New York on theLong Island Expressway. Chapin had shifted lanes into the path of aRickel Home Centers truck, which was unable to avoid a collision with his car, and died of a ruptured aneurysm caused by the impact. A jury later found Chapin to be 40% at fault in the accident, with the driver primarily liable, and awarded $7,200,000 to his widow.[51][52]
Thecollapse of a hotel walkway killed 114 people at the Hyatt Regency Hotel inKansas City, Missouri. At 7:05 pm, a fourth floor walk at the hotel broke from its moorings and dropped onto a second floor walk directly below, and then both structures fell into the hotel lobby. All three areas were crowded with people who had gathered for a dance. In addition to the 114 who died, 185 more were injured. Ultimately, the disaster was traced to a flaw in design and construction. While the original plan had been for the two walkways to hang separately, nuts and bolts intended to bear the weight of the fourth floor were holding the weight of both. The failure of a singlenut under the stress led to thechain reaction.[56][57]
Jack Henry Abbott, a convicted murderer turned author of the bestsellerIn the Belly of the Beast, had been paroled in June with the influence of authorNorman Mailer. Abbott and two friends walked into aManhattan cafe called Binibon, where he got into an argument with Richard Adan over use of a restroom. Abbott stabbed Adan to death and then fled the scene. Ironically, Abbott's return to crime took place as the praise of his book was being printed in that Sunday'sNew York Times Book Review.[58] Abbott would be captured two months later, convicted of the murder, and spend the rest of his life in prison until hanging himself in 2002.[59]
The existence of the "Farewell Dossier", 4,000 pages of Soviet documents that had been supplied to France by former KGB ColonelVladimir Vetrov (whose code name was "Farewell") was revealed to U.S. PresidentRonald Reagan by French PresidentFrançois Mitterrand at the summit of Western leaders inOttawa. The material showed that the Soviets had, after years of infiltration, been stealing American technological research and development. While other advisers to theNational Security Council were looking for ways to stop the leaks, Gus Weiss proposed the idea of creating defective technology and allowing it to be stolen. The first trial was for computer programs which, months after being applied to operate the Siberian gas pipeline,began to fail. (A critic notes that the USSR did not have computer-managed gas pipelines in the 1980s and that claim is highly improbable.) The existence of the Farewell Dossier would remain a secret until 1997.[60]
David Alan Kirwan, a 24-year-old tourist atYellowstone National Park, jumped into the alkaline (pH 9) and scalding (202 °F (94 °C)) Celestine Pool to save his friend's dog. The dog died within moments and its body dissolved in the hot spring. Kirwan, blinded and burned over his entire body, was airlifted toSalt Lake City and died the next day.[61][62][63][64][65]
Martina Navratilova became an American citizen at a ceremony in Los Angeles. Until then, the women's tennis star, who had defected fromCzechoslovakia, had lived in fear that she would be kidnapped and returned for trial.[66]
Died: Lou Peters, Cadillac dealer fromLodi, California, whose cooperation with the FBI led to the conviction of organized crime leaderJoe Bonanno earlier in the year. The Bureau named the Louis E. Peters Memorial Service Award in his honor.[67]
Tohui the Panda was born inChapultepec Zoo inMexico City, the first giantpanda ever to be born and survive in captivity outside of China. Tohui was the second child of Ying Ying, who accidentally crushed her first one.[68]
FTC CommissionerMichael Pertschuk announced the most comprehensive regulations ever applied to the Americanfuneral industry, ending deceptive practices after a nearly ten-year study. Among the changes were a requirement for funeral homes to itemize their prices, and a prohibition against a common practice of requiring the bereaved to buy a casket even for acremation.[70]
A coal mine fire, burning sinceMay 27,1962,[72] broke to the surface in the town ofCentralia, Pennsylvania.[73] Condemning and buying all the property in the town was less expensive than trying to extinguish the fire, so the 1,000 residents of Centralia were relocated over the next several years. The virtualghost town had 20 residents by 2003.[74]
Anartificial heart was implanted into a human being for the second time in history (the first was in 1969), as Dr.Denton Cooley placed the Akutsu-III into Willibrord Meuffels, a 26-year-oldNetherlands man undergoing bypass surgery atSt. Luke's Episcopal Hospital inHouston. Meuffels remained on the TAH for 55 hours until receiving a donor heart, dying from complications ten days later.[75][76]
In one of the largest allegedUFO sightings, thousands of people in China claimed to have observed a bright object surrounded by "Saturn-like rings" inTibet, flying for seven minutes. China's officialXinhua News Agency reported the story eleven days later.[77][78]
Kosmos 1275, a Soviet satellite that had been launched on June 4, was struck by debris while in orbit 600 miles (970 km) overAlaska, breaking into more than 140 pieces ofspace junk.[80]
Anti-apartheid protestors inHamilton, New Zealand forced the cancellation of the second game of the16 game tour by theSouth African national rugby union team (the Springboks) and the host team,Waikato.[82] Before the scheduled match could begin, 300 protestors occupied the field at Rugby Park, despite the presence of 4,700 police. The game was cancelled at 3:10 pm after word was received that a pilot had stolen aCessna plane and was flying toward the stadium, which was crowded with 27,000 fans. Nevertheless, the controversial tour continued with a game four days later atWellington.[83]
After six years, the FBI brought "OperationDonnie Brasco" to an end. Undercover agentJoseph D. Pistone had infiltrated theBonanno crime family starting in 1975, using the alias Donnie Brasco and gathering evidence for the Bureau. When the family's boss,Dominic Napolitano, asked Pistone to carry out a hit againstBruno Indelicato, his FBI handlers decided that Pistone/Brasco would be discovered. Only after Pistone's assignment ended did FBI agents inform Napolitano that his trusted aide had been an informant. Napolitano would be killed by the Bonanno mob on August 17 for making the mistake.[86]
Swelled by a downpour that had happened hours earlier and far upriver, theTanque Verde Falls inArizona was the site of aflash flood that killed eight people without warning.[87]
Born:Maicon (Maicon Douglas Sisenando), Brazilian soccer football player, inNovo Hamburgo
Adam Walsh, age 6, was kidnapped from aSears store inHollywood, Florida, and murdered. His father, hotel executiveJohn Walsh, became an activist for missing children and for crime prevention, and would later become host for the television programAmerica's Most Wanted.[88][89][90] Serial killerOttis Toole, who confessed to the crime in 1983 and then recanted, died in 1996. Investigators concluded in 2008 that Toole had been the perpetrator and closed the case.[91]
Rod Brock, owner ofSeattle Computer Products and of the86-DOS disk operating system designed by one of its former employees (Tim Paterson), sold all rights to the program toMicrosoft for $50,000. RenamedMS-DOS, the system earned Microsoft billions of dollars.[92]
In a nationally televised speech, President Reagan explained, in simple terms, his proposal for thelargest tax cut in U.S. history, and asked for the public to "contact your Senators and Congressmen. Tell them of your support for this bipartisan proposal."[93] Americans followed suit, and two days later, the bill passed the House 238–195, and the Senate 89–11.[94][95][96]
Betty Danielowski of Minnesota and her 9-year old nephew slipped from a rock and fell into Upper McDonald Creek inGlacier National Park in the U.S. state ofMontana, and her husband Donald Danielowski jumped in to save them both, and the couple both drowned in the swift current. The child was saved by his father.[97] The Danielowski's deaths were the second and third in less than a week in the same creek.[98] Five days earlier, on July 22, a 7-year old child, Kevin Dolack ofGlenview, Illinois, died after falling into the creek upstream.[99][100]
Theperigee of the Moon, its shortest distance from the Earth, coincided with the week that the Earth, Moon and Sun were aligned. During thetotal solar eclipse that happened on Friday, July 31, the Moon occluded more of the view of the Sun than usually occurs during an eclipse.
Born:Li Xiaopeng, Chinese gymnast, 4-time Olympic gold medalist, world championships in vault (1999, 2002, 2003) and parallel bars (1998, 2002, 2006), inChangsha[101]
Died:
Paul Brunton (pen name of Raphael Hurst), 81, British mystic
FatherStanley Rother, 46, American missionary who had been a Roman Catholic priest inSantiago Atitlán,Guatemala, for 13 years, was murdered by Guatemalan soldiers.
Rolf Wütherich, 54, mechanic who had been passenger withJames Dean in Dean's fatal car accident on September 30, 1955. Like Dean, Wütherich was killed while driving a Porsche at high speed, losing control in the German village ofKupferzell.[107]
Trevor Revell, 35-year-old magician and escape artist, was killed while performing at a Royal Wedding celebration inPortsmouth. England. Revell, buckled into a straitjacket, was hoisted 30 feet (9.1 m) into the air on a rope which was then set on fire. Revell escaped from the straitjacket, but the rope burned through before Revell could be lowered, and he fell headfirst onto concrete. Revell died atQueen Alexandra Hospital.[112]
Born:Fernando Alonso, Spanish race car driver, Formula One world champion in 2005 and 2006; inOviedo
Died:Robert Moses, 92, American urban planner who oversaw the growth of New York City andLong Island
Dawda Jawara, thePresident of the Gambia, was deposed in a coup while a guest at the royal wedding in Britain.Kukoi Sanyang declared himself leader of the West African nation, but was driven out when the surrounding nation ofSenegal intervened with 3,000 troops and restored Jawara to power. Later in the year, the two nations agreed to form theSenegambia Confederation, a merger that lasted ten years.[113][114]
An airplane crash killed three law enforcement officers inPittsburg County, Oklahoma, while they were searching for marijuana fields from the sky. Ronnie Fox and detective David J. Sheehan of theMcAlester, Oklahoma police, and the pilot, Oklahoma narcotics agent Bill Morgan, died after the aircraft went down in the Jack Fork foothills of theOuachita Mountains.[115] Investigators considered, but ruled out, the possibility that the plane had been shot down.[116][117][118][119]
Atotal solar eclipse was visible over much of northern Asia, from Turkey to the Soviet Union and much of Mongolia, China and Japan. Because the Moon had made its closest approach to Earth only four days earlier, the diameter of the Moon as it occluded the view of the Sun was greater than would normally have been seen.
The end of the1981 Major League Baseball strike was announced in New York by federal mediator Kenneth Moffett, after major league owners and players came to an agreement. The All-Star game, set for August 9 in Cleveland, would mark the return of baseball, and regularly scheduled games would resume on August 10.[122]
GeneralOmar Torrijos, 52, military leader ofPanama, and head of state from 1972 to 1978. Torrijos and six other people had taken off fromPenonomé in a storm, bound for Coclesito, and the plane crashed into the Cerro Julio mountain.[124]
^"10 hillside slayings admitted by suspect".Milwaukee Sentinel. July 7, 1981. p. 3.
^Schwarz, Ted (2004).The Hillside Strangler: The Three Faces of America's Most Savage Rapist and Murderer and the Shocking Revelations from the Sensational Los Angeles Trial!.Quill Driver Books. p. 253.
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