It was 1968….
British Prime Minister Harold Wilson backed the campaign for working an extra half hour…without pay;
The Tet Offensive begins in the Viet Nam war;
The 1968 Winter Olympics are held in Grenoble, France;
The Gold Standard is dropped – the US no longer matches each dollar with the equal in gold;
2001: A Space Odyssey is released at the movies, shortly followed by Planet of the Apes; Hair opens on Broadway;
The Wahine grounds with the loss of 53 lives; The last steam passenger train runs in Britain; Boeing rolls out the first 747 for the worlds media;
Saddam Hussein becomes Vice Chairman of the Revolutionary Council in Iraq after a coup;
Mattel introduces the world to Hot Wheels;
Led Zeppelin makes their first live performance; The Beatles release their White Album;
Marcus Gronholm is born; Colin McRae is born; Mika Hakkinen is born; Paul Tracey is born;
Jim Clark is killed (F2 race, Hockenheim), Mike Spence is killed (Indy 500 practice); Jo Schlesser is killed (French GP, Honda RA302), Ludovico Scarfiotti is killed (hillclimb), Robert F Kennedy is shot; Martin Luther King, Jr is shot dead;
DFV engines were offered to teams other than Lotus for the first time;
Ken Tyrell entered his first cars on the F1 grid; wings are seen for the first time in abundance;
Chris Amon took three poles, Denny Hulme had two victories, and Bruce McLaren took one, at Spa;
Graham Hill took the title, Jackie Stewart in second, and Denny Hulme, third – Bruce took fifth and Amon in tenth;
And then, a new(ish) formula was getting its first showings in the US of A….
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jV7w0kRfO1U&w=420&h=315]
