The 1970s Arts and Entertainment: Chronology

1970:     American Top 40, a weekly countdown of hits on the pop music charts hosted by Casey Kasem, debuts on nationwide radio.

1970:      Future Nobel laureate Toni Morrison publishes her first novel, The Bluest Eye.

1970:     May 2 Mississippi educational television bans Sesame Street for its racial content. The State Commission for Educational TV reverses the decision on May 24.

1971:      Margaret Harris conducts the Chicago Symphony, becoming the first African American woman to lead a major orchestra.

1971:     January 12 All in the Family, produced by Norman Lear, debuts on television as a mid-season replacement series.

1971:     May 17 The rock musical Godspell, written by Michael Tebelak and Stephen Schwartz, opens on Broadway.

1971:     October 12 The rock musical Jesus Christ Superstar, written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, opens on Broadway.

1972:     March 15 The Godfather, Francis Ford Coppola's film adaptation of the bestselling novel by Mario Puzo, opens in movie theaters.

1972:     July Actress Jane Fonda arrives in Hanoi, North Vietnam, to begin a two-week tour of the country, during which she will denounce American political and military leaders as "war criminals."

1972:     July The first regular issue of Ms. magazine, founded by Gloria Steinem, Pat Carbine, and others, hits the newsstands.

1973:      Erica Jong publishes her first novel, the controversial and ground-breaking Fear of Flying.

1973:     March The English rock group Pink Floyd releases its landmark album The Dark Side of the Moon. It remains on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart for 741 weeks.

1973:     December 26 The Exorcist, based on the best-selling novel of the same name by William Peter Blatty, debuts in theaters. The terrifying film initially created mass hysteria, causing some viewers to faint.

1974:      The "garage" band the Ramones, whose fast, three-chord sound ushers in the American punk rock movement, begins playing at the New York City club CBGB.

1974:      Disco, a beat-driven dance music popular in the black and gay communities, finds mainstream success with hits such as "Rock the Boat," "Rock Your Baby," and "Kung Fu Fighting."

1974:     March 4 The first issue of People magazine, an offshoot of Time magazine focusing on celebrities and "real life" stories, hits the newsstands.

1975:      The Rocky Horror Picture Show, an off-beat musical about a Transylvanian transvestite, is released and soon gains cult status.

1975:     January 5 The all-black musical The Wiz opens on Broadway, eventually tallying 1,672 performances.

1975:     May 21 A Chorus Line debuts at the Newman Theater in New York City.

1976:      American writer Saul Bellow wins the Nobel Prize for literature.

1976:      The exhibit Two Centuries of Black American Art opens at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

1976:     September 26 The Muppet Show debuts on syndicated television.

1977:     February 20 Alex Haley's Roots is listed by The New York Times as the top-selling book in the country for twenty consecutive weeks.

1977:     May 25 Star Wars, directed by George Lucas, opens in thirty-two movie theaters across the country.

1977:     August 19 Singer Elvis Presley dies of heart failure at the age of forty-two.

1977:     December Saturday Night Fever, a movie starring John Travolta, is released and quickly becomes a popular phenomenon.

1978:      Issac Bashevis Singer wins the Nobel Prize for literature, becoming the second American writer to win in three years.

1978:     January The English punk rock band the Sex Pistols breaks up in the middle of its first American tour when singer Johnny Rotten quits the band.

1978:     January 4 The top-selling paperback in the country, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, is a novelization of the film script.

1978:     May 9 Ain't Misbehavin', an all-black musical featuring the music of Fats Waller, opens on Broadway, eventually racking up 1,604 performances.

1979:      The first digitally recorded album, Ry Cooder's Bop Till You Drop, is released.

1979:     March 14 Judy Chicago's controversial feminist artwork The Dinner Party is first exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

1979:     September 15 Massachusetts adopts the nation's first lottery to support the arts.