Life and times of our region 50 years ago
WE step back half a century to another year of progress, change and, as ever, conflict.
Dr Christian Barnard performed the first heart transplant; the Boeing 747 airliner made its maiden journey; and the first Big Mac went on sale in the United States.
In our region, day-to-day life for a population dependent on traditional industries seemed to be ticking along as normal, but under the surface there were problems.
The year was marked by one disaster after another for the Labour government. Along with a deepening economic crisis, there was constant sniping from the unions, a series of Cabinet splits over key policies and an almost constant sense of paranoia in Downing Street, which was displaying a siege mentality.
Internationally, 1968 was a momentous year by any standards.
The Vietnam war continued to rage, while the campaign against it gained ground by the day. The My Lai massacre of that year contributed massively to the eventual pull-out.
Richard Nixon became US president, Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were assassinated, and pop art icon Andy Warhol was shot and wounded by a disaffected follower.
Paris was engulfed by student protests, which seemed set to pitch France into revolution, until President de Gaulle threatened to send in the troops.
And the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia with more than 200,000 troops to bring to an end the Prague Spring of opposition to Communist rule.
In Britain there was an influx of Kenyan Asians into the country as the issue of immigration made the headlines. It led to Enoch Powell’s infamous “rivers of blood” speech in which he warned of race riots across Britain.
Back on Tyneside, Newcastle Civic Centre became the city’s seat of government, while the British rock band Led Zeppelin - who would become the world’s biggest group in the 1970s - made their UK debut at Newcastle’s Mayfair ballroom.
Finally, fans of Newcastle United had something to cheer. Supporters dug out their passports as United qualified for European football through the Inter Cities Fairs Cup for the first time in the club’s history
The following year, 1969, fans incredibly would see United lift the trophy - their first after a 14-year drought, it was declared at the time.
Little did they know, longsuffering supporters would still be waiting for the next one more than 50 years later.
We recall the life and times of the North East in 1968 using the unique picture archive of the Sunday Sun. Front: The Flying Scotsman thundered into the Central Station, Newcastle on a non-stop run from London’s King Cross station to Edinburgh, May 1968
Above, the all-conquering Redheugh Junior School Football team and Miss Rosilind Laidlaw, Gateshead,1968; left, N Wood’s, butcher’s shop, Hendon Road, Sunderland, 1968 (Beamish Museum) Avondale Road in Byker, 1968, looking towards the River Tyne and Newcastle city centre