October 1974

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  1
One of professional basketball's highest-scoring players (on and off the court), Wilt Chamberlain announces his retirement.
 2
 3
Mountain play Radio City Music Hall and dress up for the occasion, wearing grand white suits. They also inject a little theater into the proceedings: Corky Laing's drum sticks are set alight, followed by his tom-tom rims while a fireworks display explodes on the big screen behind him, and at the show's end, the stage is lowered from sight.
 4
Irish rockers Thin Lizzy play their first date with the twin-guitar lineup of Scott Gorham and Brian Robertson, in Aberystwyth, Wales.
 5
Randy Newman performs at the Atlanta Symphony Hall, accompanied by an eighty-seven- piece symphony orchestra. Conducting the orchestra is Randy's uncle, Emil Newman.

Top of the charts: Olivia Newton-John's "I Honestly Love You" (pop single); the Beach Boys's Endless Summer (pop album).
6
 7
French pop singer Veronique Ssanson plays her first show in Paris in two years. Her backup band includes Joe Lala, Denny Seiwell, Donnie Dacus, Alan Savati, a sixteen-piece string ensemble, four horns and husband Stephen Stills on bass. Asked if the two might become the new Sonny and Cher, Stills exclaims, "Good God, no!"
 8
Dionne Warwick, one of the biggest hitmakers of the Sixties, has a dry spell for several years before making a comeback with a Number One hit, "Then Came You," recorded with the Spinners. It becomes the first Number One of her career.

Wearing a button that says WIN, President Ford explains the acronym by stating that his economic reform program inteds to "Whip Inflation Now."
 9
Olivia Newton-John, destined to become one of the most popular singers of her day, earns her third gold record for "I Honestly Love You," which reached Number One on the pop chart four days ago, and will remain atop the chart for two weeks. Her first two gold records were "If You Love Me (Let Me Know)" and "Let Me Be There," which reached #5 and #6 respectively, earlier this year.

Jazz-funk composer, arranger and producer Quincy Jones, who has already won several Grammy Awards, earns his first gold record for Body Heat, which includes the hit single "If I Ever Lose This Heaven," sung by Minnie Riperton.
 10
 11
 12
13
TV's legendary variety-show host Ed Sullivan dies.
 14
 15
Alice Cooper's Greatest Hits turns gold, but Alice is already in the process of dumping the band for a solo career.
 16
 17
The Oakland A's defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers in five games and win their third consecutive World Series.
 18
The Odessa File, a film based on the best-selling novel about a reporter investigating neo-Nazis and starring Jon Voight, opens.
 19
20
Ex-Animal Eric Burdon and his wife, Rose, have a baby girl in Palm Springs, California, and name her Mirage.
 21
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 25
Mary Woodson, purported to be Al Green's girlfriend, shoots herself to death in the singer's home just north of Memphis. The shooting, which is later ruled a suicide, comes after the woman (who suffered from depression) had thrown a pot of boiling grits on Green as he was getting out of his bathtub. Green is taken to a local hospital with first- and second-degree burns on his back, neck and arms. The former gospel singer will soon return to the church, adopt a sacred-music-only repertoire and become a minister.
 26
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 29
Following surgery for phlebitis, former president Richard Nixon suffers postoperative shock and falls into critical condition in California. Judge Sirica will excuse him from two ongoing Watergate trials until Feb. 1975. He will not testify at either.
 30
Less than six months after her marriage to Sly and the Family Stone frontman Sylvester Stewart in Madison Square Garden, Kathey Silva Stewart files for divorce and is awarded custody of their fourteen- month-old son, Sylvester Bubb Ali Stewart. The boy and his father are missing, and are believed to be in hiding.

In a moonlit "Rumble in the Jungle" championship bout that begins at 4:00 a.m. local time, Muhammad Ali regains the heavyweight boxing title in Kinshasa, Zaire, defeating George Foreman in eight rounds.
 31
The Rolling Stones' It's Only Rock n' Roll, their last album with guitarist Mick Taylor, turns gold. It is their fourth consecutive Number One LP.
  


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