The Florida Education Association (FEA) initiates a mass resignation of teachers to protest state funding of education. This is, in effect, the first statewide teachers' strike in the United States.
Vietnam War – My Lai Massacre: American troops kill scores of civilians. The story will first become public in November 1969 and will help undermine public support for the U.S. efforts in Vietnam.
March 17 – A demonstration in London's Grosvenor Square against U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War leads to violence; 91 people are injured, 200 demonstrators arrested.
March 19–23 – Afrocentrism, Black Power, Vietnam War: Students at Howard University in Washington, D.C., signal a new era of militant student activism on college campuses in the U.S. Students stage rallies, protests and a 5-day sit-in, laying siege to the administration building, shutting down the university in protest over its ROTC program and the Vietnam War, and demanding a more Afrocentric curriculum.
March 22 – Daniel Cohn-Bendit ("Danny the Red") and 7 other students occupy the administrative offices of the University of Nanterre, setting in motion a chain of events that lead France to the brink of revolution in May.
March 28 – Brazilian high school student Edson Luís de Lima Souto is shot by the police in a protest for cheaper meals at a restaurant for low-income students. The aftermath of his death is one of the first major events against the military dictatorship.
March 30 – Paradiso in Amsterdam opened its doors under the name 'Cosmic Relaxation Centre Paradiso'
In a television special broadcast in the United States on NBC, white British singer Petula Clark touches black American singer Harry Belafonte affectionately on the arm.
Apollo program: Apollo-Saturn mission 502 (Apollo 6) is launched, as the second and last unmanned test-flight of the Saturn V launch vehicle.
AEK Athens wins the FIBA European Cup Winners Cup Final against Slavia Prague, in front of a record attendance of 80,000 spectators. It is the first major European trophy won at club level of any sport in Greece.
April 10 – The ferry TEV Wahine strikes a reef at the mouth of Wellington Harbour, New Zealand, with the loss of 53 lives, in Cyclone Giselle, which has created the windiest conditions ever recorded in New Zealand.
Josef Bachmann tries to assassinate Rudi Dutschke, leader of the left-wing movement (APO) in Germany, and tries to commit suicide afterwards, failing in both, although Dutschke dies of his brain injuries 11 years later.
German left-wing students blockade the Springer Press HQ in Berlin and many are arrested (one of them Ulrike Meinhof).
Nigerian forces capture Port Harcourt and form a ring around the Biafrans. This contributes to a humanitarian disaster as the surrounded population already suffers from hunger and starvation.
July 18 – The semiconductor company Intel is founded.
July 20 – The first International Special Olympics Summer Games are held at Soldier Field in Chicago, Ill, with about 1,000 athletes with intellectual disabilities.
August 18 – Two charter buses are forced into the Hida River on National Highway Route 41 in Japan in an accident caused by heavy rain; 104 are killed.
August 28 – John Gordon Mein, U.S. Ambassador to Guatemala, is assassinated on the streets of Guatemala City, the first U.S. Ambassador assassinated in the line of duty.
Albania officially withdraws from the Warsaw Pact upon the Soviet Union-led Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia, having already ceased to participate actively in Pact activity since 1962.
U.S. Army Major General Keith L. Ware, World War II Medal of Honor recipient, is killed when his helicopter is shot down in Vietnam. He is posthumously awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.
September 14 – Detroit TigerDenny McLain becomes the first baseball pitcher to win 30 games in a season since 1934. He remains the last player to accomplish the feat.
September 20 – Hawaii Five-O debuts on CBS, and eventually becomes the longest-running crime show in television history, until Law & Order overtakes it in 2003.
September 21 – The Soviet's Zond 5 unmanned lunar flyby mission returns to earth, with its first-of-a-kind biological payload intact.
October 2 – Tlatelolco massacre: A student demonstration ends in bloodbath at La Plaza de las Tres Culturas in Tlatelolco, Mexico City, Mexico, 10 days before the inauguration of the 1968 Summer Olympics. 300-400 are estimated to have been killed.
October 7 – At the height of protests against the Vietnam War, José Feliciano performed "The Star-Spangled Banner" at Tiger Stadium in Detroit during Game 5 pre-game ceremonies of the 1968 World Series between the Tigers and the St. Louis Cardinals. His personalized, slow, Latin jazz performance proved highly controversial, opening the door for later interpretations of the national anthem.
October 10 – 1968 World Series: The Detroit Tigers defeat the St. Louis Cardinals in the best of 7 series (4 games to 3) after being down 3 games to 1, completing an unlikely comeback against the heavily favored Cardinals led by the overpowering right-handed pitcher Bob Gibson. The final score of Game 7 is 4-1.
In Panama, a military coup d'état, led by Col. Boris Martinez and Col. Omar Torrijos, overthrows the democratically elected (but highly controversial) government of President Arnulfo Arias. Within a year, Torrijos ousts Martinez and takes charge as de facto Head of Government in Panama.
In Mexico City, African-American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos raise their fists in a black power salute after winning, respectively, the gold and bronze medals in the Olympic men's 200 metres.
October 18 – US athlete Bob Beamon breaks the long jump world record by 55 cm / 21¾ ins at the Olympics in Mexico City. His record stands for 23 years, and is still the second longest jump in history.
October 31 – Vietnam War: Citing progress in the Paris peace talks, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson announces to the nation that he has ordered a complete cessation of "all air, naval, and artillery bombardment of North Vietnam" effective November 1.
November[]
Richard Nixon (pictured) is elected United States President.
November 17 – The Heidi Game: NBC cuts off the final 1:05 of an Oakland Raiders–New York Jets football game to broadcast the pre-scheduled Heidi. Fans are unable to see Oakland (which had been trailing 32–29) score 2 late touchdowns to win 43–32; as a result, thousands of outraged football fans flood the NBC switchboards to protest.
November 17 - British European Airways introduces the BAC One-Eleven into commercial service.
"Plato's Stepchildren", 12th episode of Star Trek 3rd season is aired, featuring the first-ever interracial kiss on U.S. national television between Lieutenant Uhura and Captain James T. Kirk.
The film Oliver!, based on the hit London and Broadway musical, opens in the U.S. after being released first in England. It goes on to win the Academy Award for Best Picture.
December 13 – Prompted by growing unrest and a perceived proliferation of "pro-communist" violent actions, BrazilianpresidentArtur da Costa e Silva enacts the so-called AI-5, the fifth of a series of non-constitutional emergency decrees allegedly to help "stabilize" the country after the turmoils of the early 1960s.
December 17 – In England, Mary Bell, aged 11, is found guilty of murdering two small boys and sentenced to life in detention, but is later released from prison in 1980 and granted anonymity.
United Artists pulls eleven Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons in its library from television due to the depiction of racist stereotypes towards African-Americans. These cartoons come to be known as the Censored Eleven.
^"Gloria Trevi". Biography.com. April 17, 2019. Retrieved August 24, 2019.
Further reading[]
Sherman, Daniel J. et al. eds. The Long 1968: Revisions and New Perspectives (Indiana University Press; 2013) 382 pages; essays by scholars on the cultural and political impact of 1968 in France, Mexico, Northern Ireland, the United States, etc.
Kurlansky, Mark. (2004). 1968: The Year that Rocked the World. London: Jonathan Cape. ISBN978-0-224-06251-0
1968 – The Year in Sound An Audiofile produced by Lou Zambrana of WCBS Newsradio 880 (WCBS-AM New York) Part of WCBS 880's celebration of 40 years of newsradio.
TIME Magazine, 40th Anniversary Special (2008). "1968: The Year That Changed the World."