Just the Fax

January 4
In his State of the Union message, President Johnson outlines programs for a "Great Society" to attack poverty in America.

January 24
Winston S. Churchill dies at age 90 in London following a stroke.

February
Dr. Martin Luther King is arrested in Selma, Alabama, while protesting state regulations on voting.

February
US planes begin bombing North Vietnam.

February 21
Malcolm X, black-nationalist leader, (left) is shot to death at a rally in Harlem.

March 8
First American combat troops arrive in South Vietnam.

Well We All Need Someone We Can Lean On...
Young and brash, the London-based Rolling Stones (right) issue a challenge to the Beatles for musical supremacy with their first major hit in the US, I Can't Get No Satisfaction, in the summer of 1965. The Stones will go on to become the original bad boys of Rock and Roll and will still be playing concert dates forty years later.

March
President Johnson declares war on poverty. He signs an Economic Opportunity Act in August and appoints R. Sargent Shriver, to head the new Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO).

June
Congress authorizes the use of ground troops in Vietnam. 125,000 US troops are in Vietnam in June. By the end of the year, a total of 190,000 American soldiers will be in place in that divided country.

July 30
President Johnson signs the bill enacting Medicare as part of the "Great Society."

August
The Voting Rights Act becomes law.

August 11-16
Race riots in the Watts section of Los Angeles result in 34 deaths. More than 200 businesses are destroyed. Other riots rock Detroit, New York, Philadelphia and other northern cities.

August 17
The American army launches Operation Starlite in Chu Lai, Vietnam. In the first major battle of the war, US ground forces, artillery, ships and air support combine to kill nearly 700 Vietcong soldiers. US forces sustain 45 dead and over 200 wounded.

November 9
At 5:27 p.m. EST the entire Northeast area of the United States and large parts of Canada suddenly go dark. From Buffalo to the eastern border of New Hampshire and from New York City to Ontario, a massive power outage strikes without warning and is henceforth referred to as the Blackout of 1965.

November 6-15
Members of the 7th Cavalry and 8th Cavalry, some 450 in strength, are choppered in and are engaged by 2,000 North Vietnamese Army regulars of the 325th NVA Regiment in the Ia Drang Valley, in western South Vietnam. Hard fought over the course of several weeks, Ia Drang is the first large open battle between the US and North Vietnam. Both sides take heavy losses, with many NVA members killed in human wave attacks against the surrounded Americans. In a taste of things to come, the NVA withdraws into "neutral" Cambodia when faced with US and South Vietnamese reinforcements.

December 25
James M. Faria and Robert T. Wright of Monsanto Industries co-invent an artificial playing surface, the patent for which is filed this day. The Houston Oilers new AstroDome stadium is the first field where the material is used, and the word Astroturf enters the lexicon.

In Movie Theatres
Dr. Zhivago, The Sound of Music, A Thousand Clowns, Darling

New Books
James Baldwin, Going to Meet the Man
Malcolm X, The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Ralph Nader urges consumer protection with Unsafe at Any Speed
Sylvia Plath, Ariel, The Uncollected Poems

Deaths
Nat King Cole, velvet voiced singer
T.S. Eliot, author
Adlai Stevenson, US Senator, twice presidential candidate, US Ambassador to the UN