Averaged over the contiguous United States, this is the coldest month since at least 1880 with a mean temperature of 21.92°F or −5.60°C as against an 1895 to 1974 January mean of 29.99°F or −1.12°C.[1]
The maximum temperature at 31.26°F or −0.41°C is also the coldest on record for any month and the only occasion when the area-averaged contiguous US mean maximum has fallen below freezing.[2]
February 14 – In Kabul, Muslim extremists kidnap the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs, who is later killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police.
February 1–28 – With a statewide water-equivalent precipitation average of only 0.72 inches (18.3mm), this is Alaska's driest month since records began in 1925, and first driest month since being admitted to statehood in 1959.[a][3]
April 1 –Nickelodeon debuts on cable television, playing children's television shows 24 hours a day. Pinwheel, which first premiered on the channel C-3 in 1977, was one of the first shows to be broadcast on the channel.
April 2 –Major League Baseball umpires go on strike, forcing replacements from the minor leagues, college and high school to be used for the first seven weeks of the season. Union umpires return to work May 18.
June 20 – A Nicaraguan National Guard soldier kills ABC TV news correspondent Bill Stewart and his interpreter Juan Espinosa. Other members of the news crew capture the killing on tape.
July 15 – President Carter speaks to Americans about ‘'a crisis of confidence.'’ The speech will come to be known as ‘'the malaise speech,’’ though Carter never used the word ‘'malaise.'’
July 19 – The Sandinista National Liberation Front concludes a successful revolutionary campaign against the U.S.-backed Somoza dictatorship and assumes power in Nicaragua.
August 6 – The 5.7 MwCoyote Lake earthquake affected the South Bay and Central Coast areas of California with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VII (Very strong), causing 16 injuries and $500,000 in damage.
August 9 –Raymond Washington, co-founder of the Crips, today one of the largest, most notorious gangs in the United States, is shot and killed 5 months after his arrest for quadruple murder (his killers have not yet been identified).
August 29 – A national referendum is held in which Somali voters approve a new liberal constitution, promulgated by President Siad Barre to placate the United States.
September
September 1 – The U.S. Pioneer 11 becomes the first spacecraft to visit Saturn, when it passes the planet at a distance of 21,000km.
September 12 –Hurricane Frederic makes landfall at 10:00p.m. on Alabama's Gulf Coast.
November 2 –Assata Shakur (ne' Joanne Chesimard), a former member of Black Panther Party and Black Liberation Army, is liberated from a Clinton, New Jersey prison and soon shuttled off to Cuba where she remains under political asylum.
November 4 –Iran hostage crisis begins: 3,000 Iranian radicals, mostly students, invade the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and take 90 hostages (53 of whom are American). They demand that the United States send the former Shah of Iran back to stand trial.
November 12 –Iran hostage crisis: In response to the hostage situation in Tehran, U.S. President Jimmy Carter orders a halt to all oil imports into the United States from Iran.
December 21 –Chrysler receives government loan guarantees upon the request of CEO Lee Iacocca.[6]
December 1, 1978 to February 28, 1979
This is the coldest winter over the contiguous US since at least 1895 with a mean temperature of 26.62°F or −2.99°C as against an 1895/1896 to 1973/1974 seasonal mean of 31.94°F or −0.03°C.[7] Except for normally frigid upstate Maine, all of the conterminous United States was below average for the winter, an occurrence previously seen only in 1898/1899 and 1909/1910.[8]
Both the contiguous US winter mean maximum temperature at 36.73°F or 2.63°C (1895/1896 to 1973/1974 mean 42.44°F or 5.80°C)[9] and the minimum temperature at 16.51°F or −8.61°C (1895/1896 to 1973/1974 mean 21.44°F or −5.87°C)[10] are the coldest since at least 1895.
↑ For comparison the contiguous US has had only one month drier than February 1979 in Alaska from coast to coast, namely October 1952 with only 0.54 inches or 13.7 millimetres.
↑ The Harley-Davidson Reader. Michael Dregni, Hunter S. Thompson, Sonny Barger, Evel Knievel, Jean Davidson, Arlen Ness. MotorBooks International, 7 Feb 2010
↑ Greene, David (1986). Greene's Biographical Encyclopedia of Composers. London: Collins. p.1164. ISBN978-0-00434-363-1.
↑ "Ann Dvorak". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 6 February 2020.
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