French pupils protesting against a sex ban in their school dormitories and a British doctor receiving an unexpected inheritance – with certain stipulations – made the headlines four decades ago this week.
February 4, 1979
● A postmortem examination on Sid Vicious would be carried out to ascertain whether any poison was involved in the death of the British punk rocker after a heroin overdose. Medical examiners, who called the death of the skeletal Sex Pistol an accidental drug overdose, said they were checking for the possibility of poison and other substances.
● Texas was graced with a new – and unexpected – rodeo star. As Chinese Vice-Premier Deng Xiaoping donned a cowboy hat, clutched a pair of spurs, and took a ride in a stagecoach, the crowd whooped and roared in approval in true Texan style. In this fashion, Deng was accepted by the Old West and became “one of them” during his nine-day tour of the United States.
February 5, 1979
● One of the world’s leading concert artists, Chinese pianist Fou Ts’ong, was expected to return to China in late April for the first time since he defected and settled in Britain 20 years earlier. He was expected to attend a memorial ceremony in Shanghai for his father, the noted writer and translator Fou Lei. His father and mother both committed suicide after they came under attack during the Cultural Revolution in 1966.
The USSR’s richest street cleaner and the man who bit a dog
● The captain of a Kwun Tong restaurant was stabbed twice in the back by a diner during an argument over table reservations.
February 6, 1979
● Deng Xiaoping and his party left Seattle on completion of their nine-day official visit to the US with a message of welcome to all “American friends” to visit China. Seattle was the last stop on the vice-premier’s tour, the first such visit by a senior Chinese leader in 30 years.
● Customs officers seized heroin worth HK$100,000 hidden in a box of crabs. They also arrested a 15-year-old boy when they found the drugs at the waterfront in Western district. The drug was discovered during a routine search of a junk delivering crabmeat from Macau.
Bikini-clad Russian girl swims to Australian safety, and protests in Beijing
February 7, 1979
● Pupils at a provincial French boarding school went on strike in protest against the headmaster’s refusal to let the boys sleep in the girls’ dormitories at weekends. The sleep-in claim was one of a series of demands handed in by the students of the Mirepoix Lycee in the mountainous Ariege district of southwestern France.
● A Melbourne woman who had not spoken to her brother for more than 50 years was trying to claim a share of his US$1 billion will.
● A Shanghai group was staging the first public performance of a foreign play in China in 13 years, Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. All tickets for the 16 scheduled performances – in Mandarin – were sold out in three days.
February 8, 1979
● A retired Hong Kong civil servant won his second Mark Six lottery draw and picked up a HK$1,365,129 first prize. Originally, he bought four tickets with a number of friends, but none of those won anything. He also spent another HK$2 on a single ticket, which led him to winning the jackpot.
More sex please and a dozy burglar: headlines from four decades ago
February 9, 1979
● Britain’s major tank maker had been discussing the possibility of helping to refurbish China’s tank factories. A team from Vickers, which made Britain’s main battle tank, the Chieftain, between the 1960s and 1980s, declined to give further details following a recent visit.
February 10, 1979
● A British doctor received a surprise inheritance of £240,000, provided he looked after the benefactor’s dog. Doreen Wilcock died in Manchester without any family or friends, so she left her fortune to her family doctor on the condition he looked after her 11-year-old English setter, Patti.
● Astonished electricity board officials were left holding the baby of a young British couple who decided that “abandoning” their 13-day-old son was the only way to protest against their power being cut off at home. Simon and Cathy Wood took their infant to the government office in Cornwall and left him there, saying their home was too cold for him. The protest worked.
● Hong Kong’s population at the end of 1978 was estimated at about 4.72 million – an increase of 153,310 over the previous year. A significant factor in the increase was immigration from mainland China, according to the government.
Remember A Day looks at significant news and events reported by the Post during this week in history
This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Baby in power protest, retiree’s jackpot win and ‘cowboy’ Deng
