News stories from Saturday April 19, 1975
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- The anniversary of the battles that opened the American Revolution was celebrated by more than 160,000 Americans at the scene of the first engagements at Concord and Lexington. The way some of the onlookers marked the 200th anniversary reflected the differing strains that have developed through the years since the nation's birth. In sharp contrast to the noisy outbursts of a throng of rain-soaked and largely beer-fueled youths at Concord, the ceremonies at Lexington went off quietly, marked with pageantry depicting the Minutemen's first stand against the British, and a warm and cordial welcome was given President Ford. [New York Times]
- In Concord President Ford told a huge crowd of onlookers, many of them hostile, that "now is the time for reconciliation, not recrimination." Standing at the foot of the Old North Bridge where, 200 years ago, a small band of Minutemen turned back a column of British Regulars, the President drew jeers, boos and obscenities from a segment of the crowd when he spoke of America's military strength and world leadership role. On two occasions small knots of protesters tried to dash across the river toward the President but were driven back through the waist-deep water by the police. [New York Times]
- In Vietnam, Communist forces overran the last government-held enclave on the central coast, and North Vietnamese gunners brought the huge Bien Hoa air base, fifteen miles from Saigon, under heavy attack. The four-day artillery attack on the air base left it virtually unusable. The government is moving most of its fighter planes from Bien Hoa to Saigon's Tan Son Nhut airport. [New York Times]
- A shroud of uncertainty brought on by a blackout on customary news channels has enveloped the situation in Cambodia and its fallen capital, Phnom Penh. Since the fall of Phnom Penh three days ago, communications have been reduced to confused refugee reports at the borders, broadcast claims by the Communist radio and tenuous diplomatic assessments in other countries. [New York Times]
- A senior Viet Cong official in Saigon hinted today that the Communists might delay an expected military onslaught against the capital to allow time for a possible peaceful conclusion of the war. The official, Col. Vo Dong Giang, reiterated, however, that two conditions must be met -- that President Nguyen Van Thieu step down and that all American "military advisers disguised as civilians" leave the country. [New York Times]
- President Anwar Sadat of Egypt is embarking on a campaign to improve relations with his fellow Arabs and with the Soviet Union, just a month after the collapse of Secretary of State Kissinger's mediation mission. Mr. Sadat's Foreign Minister, Ismail Fahmy, has flown to Moscow to discuss the Geneva peace conference and to seek more financial and military aid. President Sadat will go to Saudi Arabia to meet with King Khalid, President Hafez al-Assad of Syria and Yasser Arafat, head of the Palestine Liberation Organization. [New York Times]
- India's first satellite was shot into space from the Soviet Union atop a Soviet rocket, the New Delhi government announced. All instruments aboard the spacecraft were functioning normally after a successful launching, the government said. The launching made India, already the fifth nation to be a nuclear power, the world's 11th nation to orbit a satellite. The spacecraft was named Aryabhata after an Indian astronomer and mathematician of the fifth century. [New York Times]