Dark Earth Timeline Discussion

[Simon Darkshade]

Halfway Across the 1970s: The Last Bit

- Africa is a fair bit better off in certain ways, such as the absence of particular dictators, oppressive regimes and outright wars, but that is counterbalanced in a certain sense by a lack of complete 'true' independence for the majority of her countries, at least south of the Sahara. In the ordinary sense of the word, independence implies the right to make whatever decisions a state chooses and generally exercise sovereignty fully, and that isn't really present here apart from the Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rhodesia and South Africa; everyone else amongst the ranks of the independent African states has certain limitations or red lines to various extents. There is a great deal of ambiguity as to how this manifests itself, partly to leave things up to the reader and partly not to impede future potential storylines

- China is a majorly different entity, not fitting into the comfortable Cold War paradigms or blocs and having her own interests, yet not necessarily having the openings to act upon those interests. She is not as isolated as Red China in 1975, and has increasingly rejoined world trade after the wars of 1930-1960 kept her without the system; by the same token, there are not the building blocks for the type of rocketing growth seen on Earth. The absence of the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution has been a net boon, but as of 1975, China is still seen as the epitome of Churchill's famed line about Russia

- Japan is experiencing the type of boom she did at this time historically, but with it seeming to be further magnified by the world situation. This affluence is flowing onto all aspects of Japanese society, but in a very different political milieu under the leadership of Prime Minister Yukio Mishima; the spectre of Japanese rearmament is starting to cause conversation amongst some in the West, just as it did in the East. It is a hub of high technology and progress, with particular advancement in robotics, cybernetics, computers and other emerging technologies, and this will result in something like Japanese cyberpunk starting to raise its head in coming years

- India isn't so much at a crossroads as on a different road. In the absence of Pakistan, her major defence threats are to the north; in the absence of a non-aligned movement, she is positioned in the West/Free World. There has been no sense of a Licence Raj here, or any of the major trends of the Nehru era in an India that trod a different path to independence. Whatever foreign, defence or strategic policy decisions she makes, they are made by New Delhi on her own terms and for her own reasons

- What will happen to the Postwar Economic Boom? The bubble hasn't been burst by a Middle Eastern war or OPEC action, as mentioned earlier, but this doesn't mean there is smooth sailing ahead all the way to 2000 and beyond by any stretch of the imagination. There will be another, likely nastier, stock market event in due course, which will lead to recession and struggles, but rather than a sharp cliff edge moment, we are likelier to see a return to shorter economic cycles. Across the West, this will mean that a lot of political consensus will remain unbroken and change will emerge more gradually than we saw in the late 1970s

- South America will be a lot more prominent in events, trends and circumstances as time goes by, and some growing conflicts may flare up into regional tensions there. In that continent, we will find a lot of key actors for things that are to come, as well as a very large amount of the world's resources and emerging markets

- Returning to Britain, one measure of the times was the Misery Index, which added the inflation rate to the unemployment rate; this headed into the 30s in the mid 1970s, highlighting the perception of the time. Here, DE Britain's Misery Index would be well under half that of Switzerland, based on unemployment well below 1% and inflation sitting at around 3.75%. Fundamentally, the pound in a man's pocket goes further, and he still has similar or more of them compared to @

- Racial issues still exist on Dark Earth, but one of the notes that I wove into stories quite early on was the idea that, when faced with external differences, those within seem to shrink that little yet significant bit. Thus, in a world with Martians, Venusians, orcs, goblins, ogres and dwarves, a black man or an Indian might seem that little bit less alien in some fashion. Generally speaking, the discrimination that exists is the still nasty social type, rather than any overt legal type, and its prevalence in popular culture has been somewhat constrained by the relatively smaller immigrant population within Britain, and in America, by the relatively smaller black fraction of the overall population (and its different geographical distribution). That the issue of immigration is starting to raise its head politically in Britain is more a function of the general extent of consensus, whereby there is more that the three major political parties agree about than disagree

- Broadly speaking, the situation of women is a tad better in the United States than in the more conservative countries of Europe insofar as general rights are concerned, with Britain lying between them to some extent. Financial equality, at least insofar as laws are concerned, is almost fully in reach, although the practical manifestation of that right will take a long time to flow through to reality. Divorce laws are yet to be majorly liberalised in Britain and Europe, whilst they vary across the states of America. Whilst homosexuality has yet to be decriminalised, there have been fewer prosecutions in practice on either side of the Atlantic in the period 1960-1975 compared to 1945-1960; both North America and Free Europe are distinctly better off than the Soviet Union for such individuals

- Religion is a major factor across the West, and religiosity is generally at a higher level than our 1975 across the board; a not inconsiderable fraction of this is what we'd broadly term 'cultural Christians', who attend churches because of social expectations. One manifestation of this is that there hasn't been such a comparatively noticeable Evangelical Christian emergence from the late 1960s in both the USA and Europe, what with traditional religion not seeing the same type of perceived decline in earlier decades; they are still around, but their impact is felt that bit less, like tipping a bucket of boiling water into a large bathtub that it already filled with pleasantly hot water vs doing the same to a lukewarm bath

- The teenager is starting to emerge, but in a slightly different sense to the Earthly one of an emergent social and economic market in the aftermath of the Second World War. Here, there is a sense that there is an increasing difference in the adolescent and preadolescent mind, behaviour and role in the family and society, and that with school leaving ages rising, there will need to be changes in the education system to reflect this, and in general society without. Changes are in process, but they won't necessarily be exactly the ones that we saw on Earth at this time

- In terms of a mood for political change, that varies from country to country. In Germany, there is a fairly strong preference for continuing the policy of 'steady as she goes'; in the USA, the long period of Democratic rule under JFK lead to Reagan winning as something different yet still strong, vigorous and vibrant'; in Canada and Australia, the Liberals and Labour have managed to win after long periods of Conservative rule; in France, d'Ambreville isn't too keen on letting his grand project of national renewal and greatness get interrupted by such petty concerns as politics; and in Britain, Stanley Barton and Labour have now been in power for going on 11 years, having won in 1964, 1968 and 1972, but 1976 might be a particularly difficult mountain to climb

[Simon Darkshade]

January 1975
January 1: The New Year's Honours List sees a hitherto unprecedented number of knighthoods given to sporting and cultural figures, with Roger Bannister, West Indian champion Garfield Sobers, P.G. Wodehouse, Charles Chaplin and C.S. Lewis all knighted for their services to Britain and the Empire.
January 2: The United States Army officially stands up the Ninth Army to control American divisions deployed in Austria-Hungary as part of America's commitment to security of the Western Alliance under the auspices of NATO's Southern Army Group.
January 3: Opening of the 400th oil platform in the North Sea. Production of oil and gas is expected to continue to grow over the next half a century, reaching a total of over 8 million barrels a day across over 240 known oil fields and producing the annual equivalent of over £5000 million from British fields alone. The defence of these valuable assets, both against Soviet threats in the event of general war and international terrorism is known to be particularly vexing to the Admiralty, with an entire new office dedicated to the problem being established in 1973 and a new class of patrol corvettes ordered with a primary mission of North Sea service.
January 4: Royal Navy nuclear attack submarines assigned to the Far East Fleet begin operations in a fourth general operational area in addition to the northern station covering the East China Sea, the central station in the South China Sea and the southern group operating out of Singapore, providing more extensive coverage of both Chinese and Soviet naval operations and land based targets in China and the Soviet Far East; in the latter capacity, their new Blue Moon long range strike missiles and newer marks of Lancelot cruise missiles have greatly increased the relative firepower available to the Far East Fleet.
January 5: The Tasman Bridge in Hobart, Australia is accidentally struck by the bulk carrier Lake Illawarra in a freak collision, which seems to be on the verge of bringing down an entire segment of the bridge into the Derwent when a red, white and blue streak is seen to hurtle through the air and hold it in place until police sorcerers arrive on the Tasmania Police's flying carpet.
January 6: After an incident in an NHL game on Saturday between the Boston Bruins and the Minnesota North Stars, a Boston player is indicted on a criminal charge of aggravated assault stemming from an incident of high sticking. The guilty verdict at the subsequent trial will set a notable precedent regarding excessive violence in professional sports across common law jurisdictions in years to come.
January 7: The Force Aérienne Royale Vietnamienne stands up a new wing of McDonnell-Douglas F-4 Phantom fighter-bombers, bringing their total to three Phantom wings, along with over 450 other tactical aircraft. The lion's share of South Vietnam's air defence remains under the purview of the United States Seventh Air Force, which still operates 144 F-15s, 192 F-16s, 360 F-4s, 144 F-5s and 144 F-111s in Indochina.
January 8: The War Office authorises the formation of four new British Army combined arms field forces assigned to SACEUR command, for potential service in the Mediterranean, Scandinavia or in Central Europe, with the planned units forming a new intermediate echelon between a brigade and a division. Additionally, a plan for the experimental formation of two ‘armoured cavalry regiments’, or brigade sized units consolidating current armoured reconnaissance regiments, for service with the British Army of the Rhine, have been approved for field testing over the next two years.
January 9: Venstre, lead by popular Prime Minister Egon Olsen, are narrowly returned to power in the Danish general election, with the Social Democratic Party's late rally just falling short of the threshold of forming government after a series of unfortunate events.
January 10: RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 departs New York City on her first round the world cruise, with over 5000 passengers on board in sumptuous luxury; the super liner is shadowed just beyond the horizon by the Royal Canadian Navy cruiser HMCS Ontario as a subtle security measure following some indications of a possible terrorist threat.
January 11: The Soviet Kosmos spaceship begins its final deceleration as it approaches Neptune, where its crew will conduct a number of investigations of the gas giant's moons and attempt special observations of postulated trans-Neptunian objects of particular interest to terrestrial astronomers.
January 12: The Super Bowl between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Springfield Atoms at Tulane Stadium ends in a debacle, with the new Poly-Turf surface being set alight in pre-game festivities and the Goodyear blimp almost crashing into the crowd due to a sudden medical emergency for the pilot in the early third quarter, leading to the game being rescheduled. An NFL Vice-Commissioner is heard to ask, whilst being rushed out of the stadium by police, whether the sport had been cursed.
January 13: Beginning of Project Ark, an ambitious American-lead effort to collect DNA samples of all known living plant and animal species and store them in a number of secure locations on Earth, the other planets and in space. Project Ark had its origins in a conference on the consequences of nuclear war and other extinction level events held in Washington in 1965, with President Kennedy providing key support and funding.
January 14: The House Unamerican Activities Committee begins a new round of investigations into communist penetration of the university and education sectors, following on from the top secret appendix of the Tracy Report into Disorganized Crime, Anarchism and Communist Subversion by FBI Deputy Director Dick Tracy.
January 15: Opening of Space Mountain, a new arcanely augmented rollercoaster in Walt Disney World in Florida. The completely indoor attraction has a nominal length of over 1.5 miles, and includes simulation of the takeoff of some of NASA newest rockets and spaceships, and a final special section providing a glimpse into an Orion drive starship arriving in another solar system.
January 16: The Portuguese General Staff presents a report estimating that victory is in sight in the colonial campaign in Mozambique, due to the exigencies of the directly surrounding states, but that prospects in Angola are far more open, due to the impact of infiltration and support from the Congo. It states that Lisbon cannot afford the cost of a protracted campaign there by herself, and that it is likely that foreign support or intervention would be required to engineer a decisively favourable outcome.
January 17: A vote in the French Chamber of Deputies to liberalise abortion laws fails by a margin of 256 to 219, with an unexpected shift in the vote of some Socialist deputies making the end result rather closer than previously anticipated.
January 18: The charmingly successful Irish showband, 'The Miami Showband', begins a tour of the USA after being discovered by US troops on seconded deployment to Ireland.
January 19: An earthquake registering 7 on the Richter Scale strikes the Kinnaur district of Punjab in India, damaging several villages and monasteries and uncovering a hitherto forgotten underground complex in the Spiti Valley above the Key Monastery.
January 20: Opening of of the Queen Victoria Tunnel connecting Holyhead and Dublin across the Irish Sea by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, with the new connection expected to considerably raise the ease of transport and commerce between Britain and Ireland.
January 21: The Australian Cabinet approves a new plan for the extensive use of advanced modern weather control magics over the Australian continent, with goals of expanding the current temperate zones by 25%, both increasing and scheduling rainfall in Hobart, Perth, Melbourne, Adelaide and Stuart to average levels of 60 inches and reducing maximum summer temperatures to a range between 78 and 90 degrees Fahrenheit by 1990. These ambitious measures, in concert with Commonwealth Government plans for afforestation in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Queensland, implementation of Stage 2 of the Bradfield Scheme and the Kimberley Development Plan, are part of the Hawke Government's 'Building Australia' project, spearheaded by Minister for Minerals, Energy and Resources Rex Connor.
January 22: Mobs of angry peasants attack the official mansion of local government officials in the northern highland reaches of Chiang Mai Province, burning it to the ground in their pent up rage at the alleged mishandling of recent flooding and subsequent slow relief efforts. Thai troops are dispatched from Chiang Mai to restore order, with there being some speculation as to the role of communist agitation in the disturbance.
January 23: Swiss surgeons successfully use a new surgical procedure whereby a double lumen balloon catheter is used to widen an obstructed artery in a cardiac patient in Zurich, providing for a lower risk option in cardiac cases.
January 24: Sebastião Antônio de Oliveira, a suspected Brazilian rapist and killer dubbed the 'Monster of Bragança', is lynched after an angry mob storms a police station in Bragança Paulista and hangs him in the street, having been enraged by the capture of the alleged murderer of several local children.
January 25: The Ministry of Food, following on from similar actions in France and the United States, establishes a National Strategic Cheese Reserve in a secret location beneath the southern Grampians, providing for a secure storage of supplies of each of the 1062 different varieties of cheese found in the British Isles, ranging from Cathbad, Dorset Blue Vinny and Craggy Island Wallop to Stinking Bishop, Sherwood Dale and Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch Yarg Yarg.
January 26: Debut of Space 1889, a BBC television historical drama programme on the early years of space exploration, starring Malcolm McDowell, Edward Woodward, Simon Ward, Brian Blessed, Robert Shaw, Nicol Williamson, Lewis Collins, Prentis Hancock, Martin Shaw, Anthony Andrews and Ian McShane as Sir Benjamin Disraeli. Initial reviews on the pilot episode hail the arcanely augmented special effects, aerial and space footage and superb attention to detail of the first historic flights into orbit and to Luna, as well as the innovative soundtrack by French composer Jean-Michael Jarre.
January 27: Britain and Denmark agree to a new plan for the deployment of British forces under the auspices of AFNORTH in the event of mobilisation, with a corps sized force built around Royal Marines, Commandos, and airborne, air cavalry, armoured and mechanised divisions from the Regular Army, Army Reserve and Territorial Army, to be assigned along with Canadian and Newfoundland divisions. This considerable improvement of Denmark’s defensive position is to be facilitated with new ports, air bases and prepositioned stocks of arms, ammunition and supplies, and reflects the growing Western acknowledgment of the greater Soviet threat towards Scandinavia as a whole.
January 28: Japan and the Soviet Union sign an agreement for the establishment of a joint venture for exploratory drilling for oil on Sakhalin, with Tokyo providing funding and technical expertise in exchange for a preferential sales arrangement for Japan for the next decade.
January 29: Korean and Vietnam War veteran General Preston Garvey, US Army, is awarded the Medal of Honor for his valour in the Battle of Pork Chop Hill by President Reagan at a ceremony in the White House. Garvey was most recently known for his successful role in the planning and execution of the Strategic Hamlet Programme in South Vietnam, where his indefatigable dedication to whatever new settlement needed the Army's help was one of many contributions to ultimate victory in 1970.
January 30: Austro-Hungarian architect, inventor and amateur alchemist Ernő Rubik signs an agreement for the licenced production and sale of of his 'Magic Cube' toy in Britain, after its successful sales in Budapest and Vienna, despite Rubik's cube proving to be so devilishly difficult for advertising and sales executives to master that they had to summon in the 10 year old son of the assistant sales manager for him to have a go.
January 31: The last four samples of smallpox known to be left on Earth are simultaneously destroyed in Fort Detrick, London, Chungking and Moscow after many months of negotiation between the United States, Britain, the Empire of China and the Soviet Union. Under the terms of the agreement, the known remaining live samples of the variola are to be held in an ultra-high security vault in a joint international facility in the neutral city of Stralo on Hesperia on Mars.

[jemhouston]

For some reason Lewis Collins videos have been popping up in my YouTube account.

Under rated actor.

[Simon Darkshade]

At this point, he was just breaking through into British television series, with his breakout role in The Professionals coming in 1977. Through the agency of this programme (a bit of a cross between Space 1999, From the Earth to the Moon and the miniseries adaption of James Michener's Space, along with some other elements), he is quite likely to make the jump to 'well known British television actor' and then minor stardom a bit sooner.

[Bernard Woolley]

Point of Order, Mr D, it is BRIAN BLESSED!

[Belushi TD]

Hehehe. You REALLY dislike gridiron football, don't you?

I want to reiterate that I really enjoy these windows into DE. They provide a texture, flavor and depth that is lacking in just about every other alternative universe / timeline out there.

THank you again for all your work.

Belushi TD

[Simon Darkshade]

Point of Order, Mr D, it is BRIAN BLESSED!

In defence, to capitalise his name would be to indicate that his only range is his LOUD one - he did his quiet acting fairly often in I, Claudius. It is just that his inside voice can occasionally be mistaken for RSM Brittain of the Guards.

[Simon Darkshade]

Hehehe. You REALLY dislike gridiron football, don't you?

I want to reiterate that I really enjoy these windows into DE. They provide a texture, flavor and depth that is lacking in just about every other alternative universe / timeline out there.

THank you again for all your work.

Belushi TD

It is not so much disliking it, as trying to carefully weave out and develop a plot point over a number of years so as to provide a signposted background to a major change. There's still rugby and soccer to take care of before the advent of true football...

Like a few other things, such as getting Mr. T as Secretary of Defence, there need to be a few stages to them. This is stage 5 of 15+ for ball sports.

The accident with the Goodyear Blimp was inspired by watching Black Sunday (incidentally, one of the few films where Robert Shaw plays the 'good guy') a few weeks ago when drafting out the year.

You are very welcome as ever; it is nice to have the depth and detail appreciated.

[Simon Darkshade]

January 1975 Notes:

- The NY Honours List is close to @, with the addition of Lewis and the important caveat that there have been far, far fewer Ks given out to actors, sportsmen, politicians and civil servants. About the only musician to get one was Reverend Elvis Presley, who got a KCVO for heroism in subduing a monster attack in London a few years back. There is a sense that a K is something that really has to be earned
- I’ve been tossing up the issue of an extra US field army for Austria-Hungary for some time, and it ultimately came down to there being too many units for Seventh Army to efficiently command in the event of mobilisation and REFORGER. SOUTHAG is a genuine army group command here
- More extensive and earlier exploitation of North Sea oil and gas is offset somewhat by the lower price of oil, which is $2.50 a barrel compared to $12.21 (with the further caveat that the DE USD is around 50% more valuable than the @ 1975 USD). There is less scope for any OPEC action, considering that three of the larger members are the USA, Britain and Canada
- RN SSNs in the Far East are additionally operating in the Philippine Sea to the NE of Luzon, where they can surge to the SCS or ECS, or be assigned to track Chinese and Soviet vessels as needed. They provide a bit of a regional defence to what lies out behind them, which is the operating box for the Far East Fleets SSBNs
- The Tasman Bridge collapse is prevented by some sort of capers super fellow, this one seeming to be Australian
- Historically, the NHL aggravated assault case did not result in conviction; I’m interested in how the precedent plays out in future across a number of sports. Hard play is one thing, but thuggery and violence another altogether
- South Vietnam will eventually get F-16s to go with their Phantoms
- The British Army begins experimenting with slightly different Field Forces, as well as grouping some of their Armoured Recce units together for corps screens
- A different result in the Danish election, with the PM being this fictional fellow: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egon_Olsen
- QE2 goes cruising, but the escort suggests some tip off about a possible incident…
- Note the second team in the Super Bowl, the Goodyear blimp incident (based on Black Sunday) and the rightful treatment for plastic grass
- Project Ark is a big, long term effort
- HUAC still sputters on, albeit not with the same power and dread as the 1950s
- Space Mountain is rather more extensive and exciting
- Portugal faces a tale of two coasts, as it were, and ultimately can’t maintain its colonies indefinitely
- Several members of the poor Miami Showband were historically murdered by the UVF in a horrific crime, which cries out as an injustice among so many in the sad tale of The Troubles. In a different Ireland, they have a happier fate
- An Irish Sea Tunnel can really only go in a few locations without some significant issues, and here it makes for a useful economic link
- Lots of interesting stuff on Australian weather control and modification, which will be further followed up. Rex Connor, mentioned at the end, historically had a tragic fate, being sacked for misleading Parliament over the Khemlani Loans Affair, which precipitated the Dismissal of the Whitlam Government on November 11 1975; here, he has a different fate and role in a Hawke Labour government
- More developments in cardiac surgery and treatment will follow; with a cure for cancer being in place, a lot of the research, funding and time spent on that will go towards other conditions, with further flow on effects
- The Brazilian murderer doesn’t live long enough to top himself before trial; not justice, certainly, but a grim reckoning
- The National Strategic Cheese Reserve, as well as providing an opportunity to name drop Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch, serves to show how there has been less of a policy driven limitation on British cheese production through the Milk Marketing Board. A small thing, perhaps, but a little indicator of how different societies evolve and develop
- Space 1889, as well as being a hat tip to the marvellous RPG of the same name, is one of several new television programmes that will emerge; I should really get onto my Film and TV article
- Denmark get reinforcements in new war plans and arrangements; they already had the Benelux ‘rapid deployment force’ assigned, but this new formation will include some much heavier units as a useful reserve, freeing up the lighter Anglo-Canadian, Benelux and Danish forces for appropriate role. An American contingent will be added later in the year
- Preston Garvey, of Fallout 4 fame, provides both an opportunity for a gaming joke/meme and a little hint as to the differing course of Vietnam, which is a war that will one day be told
- Rubik’s Cubes will soon bedevil the world with their witchery
- Smallpox goes bye-bye

[Dagooz]

January 9: Venstre, lead by popular Prime Minister Egon Olsen, are narrowly returned to power in the Danish general election, with the Social Democratic Party's late rally just falling short of the threshold of forming government after a series of unfortunate events.

[Simon Darkshade]

I'm glad a Dane came across that one and got the joke on both levels.

For the benefit of those who have not delved quite so much into 1970s and 80s Scandinavian films:

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/OlsenBanden

Calling him a crime boss or gangster doesn't quite do him justice, as there is more to him. Perhaps one comparison is a considerably hammier and slightly more manic combination of Arthur Daley and Delboy Trotter, with a distinct emphasis on being on the outside of the law, given his anarchistic leanings; there is also a charming semi-cartoonish character to some of his schemes.

[Simon Darkshade]

A few bits from February:

February 7: Four Polish dissidents successfully escape from Communist Poland through an ingenious tunnel under the dread fortifications of the Iron Wall prepared by a talking rabbit who insisted that he had simply taken the wrong turn at Albuquerque; his use of diversionary dynamite marked with the logo of the Acme Corporation, a long suspected CIA asset, leads to certain suspicions by investigating KGB officer M. Blagorodnyy-Fuddrov that there is more to the case that a simple rascally rabbit.

February 13: Opening of the first branch of Plastic Paddy's, a new Boston based Irish-themed keepsake, gew-gaw and bauble and trinket emporium designed to cater to Americans who trace their ancestry back to Ireland.

February 16: Noted adventurer and do-gooder Reverend Elvis Presley makes a guest appearance on The Galloping Gourmet with Graham Kerr whilst visiting Ottawa for the pursuit of clues in a long running case. Whilst preparing a peculiarly toothsome dish of bacon, strawberry jam, peanut butter and more bacon served in a fried bread croute adorned with cream, he explains the indulgent nature of the special occasion recipe with a jocular exclamation of 'You can't run an empire without luxuries, King!'

February 21: Detroit autoworker Walter Kowalski becomes the first Ford worker to be awarded a brand new car as part of Ford's new incentive programme. Kowalski, a taciturn and straightforward Korean War veteran, distant cousin of well-known San Francisco Police Chief Harry Callaghan and purported descendant of Old West gunfighter Josey Wales, selects a Ford Gran Torino Elite Sport V12 sportscar.

[jemhouston]

Little known fact about Walter Kowalski was his work with the immigrant community in keeping their children on the straight and narrow and out of gangs.

[Simon Darkshade]

That could well be, later on in life.

The local immigrant population will likely be different in character, given the lack of an exodus of Hmong and others from Indochina in the aftermath of the different war outcome; and different US immigration laws. There has been no 1965 change to immigration law or equivalent, and the older 1924 Immigration Act/National Origins Formula remains in place.

It is more likely that immigrants to his home in the Greater Detroit area will be from Germany, Austria-Hungary, France, Italy or Britain.

[Simon Darkshade]

February 1975
February 1: President Reagan announces that the US Federal Budget is set to record its first real and significant surplus since 1967 (with those of 1968 and 1971 being more nominal figures), with a total surplus of $72 billion out of the total budget of $749 billion marking the continued strong recovery from the Recession of 1973 and providing tangible hope for the long held dream of fiscal conservatives of the eventual repayment of the U.S. national debt. Under current projections, and with the use of the projected surplus, the remaining $105 billion of the debt accrued in the Second World War will be paid off by next year, leaving $786 billion since 1947 on the national account.
February 2: The unlikely pairing of a party of USGS volcanologists, a travelling British civil servant and his American companion manage to convince the populace of Dante’s Peak, Washington, to evacuate the town as an eruption of the nearby eponymous stratovolcano is imminent. An eruption begins on February 5, but no lives are lost due to the actions of Messrs Lieberman, Galvin, Roark, Bond and MacGyver.
February 3: Orion 6 begins her voyage back to Earth from Neptune, having completed her mission of exploration and testing. Mission Commander General Edwin Aldrin's broadcast before their departure from the Neptunian system, operating under a delay of four hours due to the distance involved, hails the mission as the latest step in mankind's journey towards the stars. Orion 7, launched in February 1974 and commanded by Brigadier-General Edward White, is expected to reach Orcus in 1978 and Pluto in 1979, whilst Orion 8, launched in December 1974 under Commander Elliott See, will arrive at their first target in the asteroid belt in April and Orion 9 under Commander Owen Garriott will launch in June for a return to the Jovian system.
February 4: An earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale severely damages the Chinese city of Haicheng in Mukden Province, with at least 2000 people feared dead and tens of thousands injured or made homeless. The nearby tomb of Zhang Zuolin is wrecked, and his sarcophagus appears to have vanished.
February 5: A brazen gang of thieves break into the Ducal Palace of Urbino and steal Raphael's La Muta, the Madonna di Senigallia and the Flagellation of Christ by Piero della Francesca and Leonardo's Medusa. Amid the outrage, the Carabinieri's Art Commandos are assigned the task of recovering the paintings, whilst a reward of over 700 million lira is reportedly offered by an unprecedented grand council of the thieves guilds of Italy's major cities.
February 6: Debut of the motoring magazine programme Top Wheels on the BBC, presented by Tom Coyne, Michael Aspel, Scott Stoddard and David Piper. The first episode showcases the new British cars of 1975, ranging from the Lotus Spirit, Aston Martin DB8, MGD Magna, Jaguar XJ250 and Triumph Spitfire 2400 to the Austin Prince, Morris Magister, Rover SD4, Vauxhall Cavalier, Standard Victor and Saxon Hawk full sized family cars and the increasingly popular hatchback types such as the Saxon Citizen, Morris Metro and the Austin Hunter. The performance of the newest vehicles of the last category compare favourably to the new Volkswagen Polo upon live testing, although the German vehicles remain very difficult for British drivers to import due to the long-running Anglo-German dispute over automotive non-tariff barrier.
February 7: Four Polish dissidents successfully escape from Communist Poland through an ingenious tunnel under the dread fortifications of the Iron Wall prepared by a talking rabbit who insisted that he had simply taken the wrong turn at Albuquerque; his use of diversionary dynamite marked with the logo of the Acme Corporation, a long suspected CIA asset, leads to certain suspicions by investigating KGB officer M. Blagorodnyy-Fuddrov that there is more to the case than merely that of a simple rascally rabbit.
February 8: A special train records the fastest ever run on the Cape to Cairo Railway, covering the 10,429 miles in 59 hours and 56 minutes; some journalists decry the journey as a stunt, with the limited stops along the way not reflecting regular practice, which usually sees 2 hour refreshment breaks at Bulawayo, Tunduma, Elegu, Khartoum and shorter stops along the way to pick up passengers at Bloemfontein, Johannesburg, Beitbridge, Salisbury, Livingstone, Nzega, Kampala, Juba and Fashoda.
February 9: Opening of three new deep coal mines opened in Kippen, Scotland, Goldsborough, Yorkshire and Sedgefield, Durham, through joint development between dwarven mining engineers, Imperial Coal and Scottish Coal, with each projected as producing over one and a half million tons annually.
February 10: Argentine Premier Rodriguez signs an decree ordering two corps of the regular army and 20,000 paramilitary troops of the Guardia Nacional to deploy to Tucuman Province and suppress the communist insurgency of the Ejército Revolucionario Popular and other Guevarist gangs.
February 11: Time Magazine carries a feature on the recent increase in sales of Cuban cigars, amid some studies reporting a very slight rise in general tobacco usage due to the introduction of new arcanely mutated varieties lacking many previously harmful components. The article observes that even in the modern post-cancer age, it is still likely that tobacco consumption will continue to decline on current long term trends, despite recent increases in advertising. Many smokers who have sampled the 'new tobacco' strains being tested by the 'Big 6' tobacco companies (Imperial Tobacco, British American Tobacco, Phillip Morris, Benson & Hedges, US Tobacco and R.J. Reynolds) to date have criticised them as somewhat lacking in effect.
February 12: Release of The Land that Time Forgot, a fantastical adventure film directed by Kevin Connor and adapted by Michael Moorcock from the eponymous novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, starring Michael Caine, Jon Finch, Peter Firth, John McEnery, Oliver Tobias, Mark Lester, Susan Penhaligon, Ingrid Pitt, Olivia Hussey and Jenny Agutter and filmed on location in the South Atlantic. The cost of shipping in dinosaurs for several shots added greatly to the bottom line expenses of the picture, but fortunately it is a critical and box office success.
February 13: Opening of the first branch of Plastic Paddy's, a new Boston based Irish-themed keepsake, gew-gaw and bauble and trinket emporium designed to cater to Americans who trace their ancestry back to Ireland.
February 14: The Admiralty releases a secret paper on future Royal Navy surface ship options and plans following on from the current Town class DLGs, residual 1950s and 1960s guided missile destroyers and the Type 22 and 23 frigates. Once the last tranche of Towns and the W and Z classes of destroyers are completed, it is intended that the next class of destroyer will be based around a standard 10,000t multirole hull with potential for different specialised versions. The projected Type 23s, to be laid down from 1977/78, are to be followed in the mid 1980s with a multi-role guided missile frigate, which will replaced the 64 Hunt and 72 River class now in reserve and the 36 Tribal class.
February 15: Boston physician Dr. Kenneth Edelin convicted of manslaughter after performing an abortion in October 1973 and sentenced to 15 years imprisonment under what many decry as inflexible Massachusetts legislation. Despite some gathering support of legal change in the United States, Britain and Western Europe, abortion law reform remains a comparatively niche issue with apparently only small minorities on either side of the debate moved to great passions on the issue. Some activists remain hopeful for progress on the issue over the latter half of the 1970s and 1980s as demographic change occurs and the post war 'Baby Boom' generation fully comes into their own.
February 16: Noted adventurer and do-gooder Reverend Elvis Presley makes a guest appearance on The Galloping Gourmet with Graham Kerr whilst visiting Ottawa for the pursuit of clues in a long running case. Whilst preparing a peculiarly toothsome dish of bacon, strawberry jam, peanut butter and more bacon served in a fried bread croute adorned with cream, he explains the indulgent nature of the special occasion recipe with a jocular exclamation of 'You can't run an empire without luxuries, King!'
February 17: Opening of new underground British arms complexes in Skipton, Llandovery, Athlone, Ruthin and Hawick dedicated to the production of guided missiles, operated respectively by the Hawker-Siddeley, Vickers, de Havilland, Armstrong-Whitworth and BAC production groups.
February 18: Opening of the Wyhl nuclear fusion plant in Emmendingen, Baden-Wurttemburg Germany, with a protest of three women, one elderly man, two babies and an excitable dachshund being kept at a distance from festivities by somewhat bored officers of the Reichspolizei.
February 19: Former Chilean Premier Salvador Allende and noted supporter Orlando Letelier begin a new speaking tour of Europe to raise funds for the next Chilean general election, scheduled for 1977, where Allende and his Socialist allies hope to regain power after the dismissal of 1973.
February 20: Reopening of the final Royal Dock in London's Docklands, the Queen Elizabeth II Dock, after the 10 year programme of expansion, modernisation, dredging of new channels and widening of entrance locks to accomodate warships and civilian merchant vessels with a length of up to 1200ft and a beam of up to 140ft. Larger oil supertankers and ultra large bulk carriers remain limited to Tilbury, Thamesport on the Isle of Grain and the new Britannia Port at Thurrock.
February 21: Detroit autoworker Walter Kowalski becomes the first Ford worker to be awarded a brand new car as part of Ford's new incentive programme. Kowalski, a taciturn and straightforward Korean War veteran, distant cousin of well-known San Francisco Police Chief Harry Callaghan and purported descendant of Old West gunfighter Josey Wales, selects a Ford Gran Torino Elite Sport V12 sportscar.
February 22: Express trains traveling from Trondheim and Oslo come close to colliding north of Tretten station in the middle of the Scandinavian country, with disaster only averted by the northbound Oslo train, which had precipitated the near miss by not waiting at Tretten station due to running late, utilising an older emergency siding built by the Royal Engineers during the Battle of Norway in 1941. The incident adds to voices calling for expansion of the line between Trondheim and Oslo, possibly utilising available NATO funding.
February 23: The first Vickers VC25 Victoria supersonic jumbo jet enters service with Imperial Airways, who has ordered 50 of the new huge aeroplanes. The maiden non stop flight from Heathrow to Sydney takes just 6 hours and 52 minutes, with noted socialite Lady Craven of Misselthwaite commenting that there was barely time to finish dinner before the flight began its landing preparations.
February 24: Coronation of Mahārājdhirāja Birendra of the Indian princely state of Nepal in Kathmandu at 8:37 a.m., a time appointed as being of the paramount auspiciousness for his forthcoming reign. Their predictions are met, with three of the rare Himalayan dragons descending from the mountainous skies to offer their regard and homage at the climax of the ceremony.
February 25: President Reagan, visiting an elementary school in New York City, declares that every school in the United States will have a library and a computer by 1980, and that every one of the over 10,000 universities and colleges will be linked with each other and friendly nations overseas through an 'international network of the Free World.'
February 26: The declassification of the 1950 National Security Council paper United States Objectives and Programs for National Security, better known as NSC 68, is subjected to its third last minute postponement to complete a new round of sanitisation of sources and data and the complete elision of one particular section for reasons of ongoing national security.
February 27: Retired Field Marshal Montgomery, Duke of El Alamein, fulfills a long promised pledge to visit Australia and New Zealand and review the veterans of his famed victory in North Africa, having begun his Southern hemisphere trip with visits to Salisbury and Cape Town to review Rhodesian and South African troops.
February 28: A gang of heavily armed bank robbers attempt to hold up a branch of the Société Générale in Paris, but their plans for a swift getaway are foiled by a little old lady wrecking their car in her automaton sedan chair. The would-be criminals retreat to the bank, beginning a siege by police and gendarmes; a number of rough looking mustachioed men in leather jackets and civilian clothes are seen observing the building amid the security forces.