TV actress Rhoda Montemayor

Events in 1979 and 31-5

Events in the world in the birth year of Rhoda Montemayor

• Vietnam and Vietnam-backed Cambodian insurgents announce fall of Cambodian capital Phnom Penh and collapse of Pol Pot regime (Jan. 7).
• Shah leaves Iran after year of turmoil (Jan. 16); revolutionary forces under Muslim leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, take over (Feb. 1 et seq.).
• Conservatives win British election; Margaret Thatcher becomes new prime minister (May 3).
• Carter and Brezhnev sign SALT II agreement (June 14).
• Nicaraguan President General Anastasio Somoza Debayle resigns and flees to Miami (July 17); Sandinistas form government (July 19).
• Iranian militants seize US embassy in Teheran and hold hostages (Nov. 4).
• Soviet invasion of Afghanistan stirs world protests (Dec. 27).

Birthday Rhoda Montemayor (31-5) in history

• Day 31-5 year 1790: The first U.S. Copyright Law was enacted, protecting books, maps, and other original materials.
• Day 31-5 year 1889: Heavy rains caused the South Fork Dam to collapse, sending 20 million tons of water into Johnstown, Pa. Over 2,200 people were killed and the town was nearly destroyed.
• Day 31-5 year 1911: The hull of the Titanic was launched in Belfast. At the ceremony, a White Star Line employee claimed, “Not even God himself could sink this ship.”
• Day 31-5 year 1961: South Africa became an independent republic.
• Day 31-5 year 1962: Former Gestapo official Adolf Eichmann was hanged in Israel.
• Day 31-5 year 1970: An earthquake in Peru left more than 50,000 dead.
• Day 31-5 year 2004: Alberta Martin, 97, one of the last widows of a U.S. Civil War veteran, died. She had married Confederate veteran William Martin in 1927 when she was 21 and he was 81.
• Day 31-5 year 2010: Nine people are dead after an Israeli navy commando attacks a flotilla of cargo ships and passenger boats on their way to Gaza to provide aid and supplies for the area.