News stories from Thursday October 5, 1978

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

The cost of food, down for two straight months, rose sharply in September to push up all wholesale prices by 0.9 percent, the government reported. It was the greatest increase since spring and a severe setback to the fight against inflation. The September report from the Labor Department said food costs soared by 1.7 percent, the largest rise since April, after falling 1.5 percent in August and 0.3 percent in July. [Chicago Tribune] The House voted 223 to 100 to sustain President Carter's veto of the $10 billion public works bill, and in doing so ignored the pleas of its leaders. The losing vote was 53 short of the two-thirds margin needed to override. Among leaders of both parties, only Robert Michel [R., Illinois] supported the President. [Chicago Tribune] Senate and House negotiators were trying to mesh two versions of a defense spending bill that are $2.7 billion apart and are at odds over the issue of abortions financed with military funds. Conferees began working on the legislation only hours after the Senate version, totaling $116.3 billion, was approved by an 86 to 3 vote. [Chicago Tribune] Uncle Sam doesn't want children to play with teddy bears and jack-in-the-boxes, The Consumer Product Safety Commission urged a ban on those and thousands of other toys regarded unsafe for toddlers, because they are small enough or have parts small enough to swallow or choke on. [Chicago Tribune] Millionaire developer Bob Graham, a former state Senator from Miami, won the Democratic nomination for governor of Florida in a stunning upset over Attorney General Robert Shevin. Graham, 41, meets another millionaire, Republican nominee Jack Eckerd of Clearwater, in the Nov. 7 general election to decide who will succeed Gov. Reubin Askew. [Chicago Tribune] On the eve of his departure for the United States, Prime Minister Ian Smith of Rhodesia made clear he is going for the jackpot -- total Western recognition of Salisbury's internationally shunned formula for black rule. "I want to appeal to the American government and the American people as a nation. I want to state my case," Smith said at a press conference. [Chicago Tribune] Sweden's first non-Socialist government in nearly half a century resigned, torn by a prolonged dispute over expansion of the country's nuclear power program. Premier Thorbjoern Faelldin handed the resignation to the speaker of the Swedish parliament, Henry Allard. Allard said he will meet leaders of all main political parties Friday and begin forming a new government. [Chicago Tribune] The stock market edged higher in the face of adverse inflation news stemming from the government's latest wholesale price report. The Dow Jones industrial average closed 2.51 points higher at 876.47.Sears, Roebuck & Co. was the only major retailer reporting a decline in sales for the five-week period ended Sept. 30. The Chicago-based retailer said sales were down 1.4 percent from the corresponding period in 1977. Other retailers reported sales gains of 11 to 17 percent. The dollar rallied in foreign exchange trading after sinking to new lows earlier in the day against key European currencies. The price of gold hit a new high for a third straight day before falling back slightly. In London, the gold price reached $223.75 an ounce. [Chicago Tribune] The Catholic-Protestant war in Northern Ireland was 10 years old today and there are signs that "the troubles" are no closer to ending. The hostilities began Oct. 5, 1968, when club-wielding Protestant police flailed into a Catholic civil rights march at Dungannon. In all, 2,363 persons have been killed and 30,000 wounded. [Chicago Tribune] Secretary of State Cyrus Vance is close enough to reaching an agreement to limit nuclear arms that he is working on plans for a signing ceremony at a U.S.-Soviet summit meeting in December, diplomatic sources said. Paul Warnke, America's chief arms negotiator, announced, meanwhile, that he soon will leave that job. [Chicago Tribune] Israeli gunboats off the Lebanese coast shelled west Beirut, but Beirut Radio said Syrian artillery drove them off in the first direct confrontation between Israel and an Arab state since the end of the 1973 Middle East war. Israel's intervention came as the Syrians bombarded Christian-held areas of the capital with the heaviest barrage of shellfire to date. [Chicago Tribune] Three doctors in Calcutta, India, announced that the world's second "test-tube" baby has been born. The baby, a girl weighing 7 pounds, 6 ounces, was delivered at a Calcutta nursing home Tuesday. The names of the parents were being kept secret, apparently out of concern that the stigma of laboratory conception might jeopardize the baby's future marriage prospects in India's conservative Hindu society. The world's first baby conceived in a laboratory, Louise Brown, was born in Oldham, England, July 25. [Chicago Tribune] A woman who turned herself into a human torch on the banks of the River Thames was a director of a world-famous London store who was depressed at the death of her wealthy French boyfriend, a close friend said. Pamela Evans-Cooper, 54, died in flames Wednesday near Windsor Castle after dousing her clothing in rubbing alcohol. [Chicago Tribune] Inmates at Gartree Prison in Leicester, England, barricaded themselves in a section of the maximum security institution after releasing several hostages seized during a riot, police said. Police said 86 prisoners were involved in the riot that started after the inmates demanded that a fellow prisoner be returned from the prison hospital. The hostages still being held included an undetermined number of guards and civilian employees, police said. [Chicago Tribune] The 1978 Nobel Prize for literature was awarded Isaac Bashevis Singer, the prolific Jewish storyteller. whose portraits of a bygone life in prewar Poland have won him a wide audience. The 74-year-old novelist and short story writer, who writes in Yiddish, has lived in New York since emigrating from his Polish homeland 43 years ago. In awarding the $165,000 prize to Singer, the Swedish Academy of Letters cited him for "his impassioned narrative art which, with roots in a Polish-Jewish cultural tradition, brings universal human conditions to life." [Chicago Tribune]

Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 876.47 (+2.51, +0.29%)
S&P Composite: 103.27 (+0.21, +0.20%)
Arms Index: 0.85

	Issues	Volume*
Advances	878	15.29
Declines	591	8.77
Unchanged	430	3.88
Total Volume		27.94

* in millions of shares

Arms Index is the ratio of volume per declining issue to volume per advancing issue; a figure below 1.0 is bullish.

Market Index Trends
Date	DJIA	S&P	Volume*
October 4, 1978	873.96	103.06	25.10
October 3, 1978	867.90	102.60	22.54
October 2, 1978	871.36	102.96	18.52
September 29, 1978	865.82	102.54	23.62
September 28, 1978	861.31	101.96	24.33
September 27, 1978	860.19	101.66	28.37
September 26, 1978	868.16	102.62	26.33
September 25, 1978	862.35	101.86	20.97
September 22, 1978	862.44	101.84	27.96
September 21, 1978	861.14	101.90	33.65