News stories from Monday January 29, 1979
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- Patricia Hearst will be freed. Her seven-year prison sentence was commuted by President Carter on the recommendation of the Justice Department. Miss Hearst was convicted in 1976 of taking part in a bank robbery by armed members of the self-styled Symbionese Liberation Army, which kidnapped her a month earlier. She has served about 22 months and has been working in the kitchen of a federal correctional institution. [New York Times]
- A 16-year-old girl opened fire at a San Diego elementary school, killing the principal and chief custodian of the school and wounding eight children and a police officer. The sniper told a reporter by telephone that she "just did it for fun." She spoke as she was holed up in her home across a street from the school. The wounded children ranged in age from 7 to 12. [New York Times]
- A strike at the largest shipyard in the country is set for midnight Tuesday. Federal mediators failed in a final effort to avert the walkout by thousands of steelworkers at the Newport News Shipyard and Dry Dock Company at Tidewater Virginia. The company has refused for more than a year to negotiate with the union. [New York Times]
- Boston University may be struck by its faculty. The battle lines were being drawn amid worsening relations between members of the first faculty union at a major private university and Dr. John Silber, its outspoken president. Both sides said that while they were at odds over raises, basic shifts in the balance of power between college administrators and faculty members were at issue. [New York Times]
- In investigating pollution, the Environmental Protection Agency conducts widespread aerial photographic surveillance of industrial facilities, usually without informing the companies, as part of its enforcement program, according to data obtained in a Freedom of Information action. The photographs include facilities of many major corporations, according to the group that got the data. [New York Times]
- A leading black New Yorker was appointed president of the Ford Foundation. He is Franklin Thomas, who was head of the Bedford-Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation from its founding in 1967 until 1977 and, before that, a deputy New York City Police Commissioner. He succeeds McGeorge Bundy, who is retiring. [New York Times]
- The ashes of Nelson Rockefeller were buried at the family estate in Pocantico Hills, N.Y., after a simple funeral attended only by family members. Nelson Jr., the 15-year-old son, said of his father: "Your spirit will live with us forever."
Megan Marshack, who summoned help moments after Mr. Rockefeller suffered a fatal heart attack, did not identify herself or Mr. Rockefeller in her call to the police. Police department tapes also showed that she was so distraught that police and medical operators had to ask her repeatedly to be calm and clarify the location and nature of the emergency.
[New York Times] - Top-level American-Chinese talks began at the White House. President Carter and Deputy Prime Minister Teng Hsiao-ping opened three days of discussions with sharply divergent public views on Soviet objectives and the wisdom of concluding a new United States-Soviet arms limitation treaty. The two leaders conferred for nearly four hours after a welcoming ceremony attended by several thousand people. Later, the White House announced that Mr. Carter had accepted an invitation to visit China extended by Mr. Teng, and White House sources said the President might make the trip late this year.
Richard Nixon attended the dinner in honor of the Chinese leader. The appearance of the former President in the White House for the first time since he resigned under threat of impeachment has generated controversy.
China is restoring "citizen's rights" to millions of former landlords, wealthy villagers and "counter-revolutionaries" who have been treated as a subclass in rural communes since their holdings were seized in the early 1950's, according to the Chinese press.
[New York Times] - The return of Ayatollah Khomeini from exile in France was reportedly being arranged in negotiations as the Iranian government announced that airports would reopen tomorrow. Earlier, troops opened fire on rioters who surged through a district of Teheran, burning more than a dozen buildings. At least seven persons were injured.
To his followers, Ayatollah Khomeini is the symbol of hatred for a corrupt monarchy, a desire to regain an Iranian identity free of foreign influence and a chance for a new but undefined way of life. But who and what is represented by the Moslem leader seems otherwise unknown.
[New York Times] - A new Mideast peace plan must be devised, possibly by way of another Camp David-type summit meeting, the Carter administration said. [New York Times]
- Pope John Paul II vowed to speak for the poor and oppressed in a visit to one of Mexico's most primitive regions. He addressed a crowd of 15,000 Indians, who danced before him and offered him flowers and fruit. [New York Times]
|
Stock Market Report
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 855.77 (-3.98, -0.46%)
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* |
| January 26, 1979 | 859.75 | 101.86 | 34.24 |
| January 25, 1979 | 854.64 | 101.19 | 31.45 |
| January 24, 1979 | 846.41 | 100.16 | 31.71 |
| January 23, 1979 | 846.85 | 100.60 | 30.18 |
| January 22, 1979 | 838.53 | 99.90 | 24.39 |
| January 19, 1979 | 837.49 | 99.75 | 26.80 |
| January 18, 1979 | 839.14 | 99.72 | 27.26 |
| January 17, 1979 | 834.20 | 99.48 | 25.31 |
| January 16, 1979 | 835.59 | 99.46 | 30.34 |
| January 15, 1979 | 848.67 | 100.69 | 27.51 |