(SFC, 12/6/02, p.E16)
1957 Sep 21, Norway's King
Haakon VII died in Oslo at age 85.
1959 Nov 20, Seven European
nations (Austria, Britain, Denmark, Norway, Portugal, Sweden,
Switzerland) signed the Stockholm Convention to form the European
Free Trade Association (EFTA). The organization becoming operative
on May 3 1960.
1959 Norway’s Stolt-Nielsen
shipping group was founded and grew to become one of the biggest
players in Norway's large shipping industry.
1967 May 11, The United Kingdom
re-applied to join the European Community. It is followed by Ireland
and Denmark and, a little later, by Norway. General de Gaulle is
still reluctant to accept British accession.
1968 In San Francisco Mayor
Alioto greeted King Olav V of Norway with a grand reception at City
(SFEC, 2/1/98, p.A10)
1969 May 25, Thor Heyerdahl
(1914-2002), Norwegian ethnographer and adventurer, departed with
his crew on the reed raft Ra for from Morocco. They abandoned their
trip 1 week shy of Barbados. Heyerdahl sailed across the Atlantic in
his Egyptian reed boat, Ra, and reported on garbage floating
everywhere in the sea. On 16 July the crew was saved by the American
yacht Shenandoah. In just 56 days they had sailed a distance of
2,700 nautical miles.
1969 Oct 12, Sonja Henie
(b.1912), Norwegian ice skater (Olympic-gold-1928,32,36) and
film star, died of leukemia on a flight from Paris to Oslo. Henie's
career included a record 10 consecutive world championships.
(SSFC, 10/5/03, Par
1969 Oct, Economists Jan
Timbergen (1903-1994) of the Netherlands and Ragnar Frisch of Norway
were awarded the first Nobel Prize in Economics for having developed
and applied dynamic models for the analysis of economic processes.
Tinbergen was a founding trustee of Economists for Peace and
1970 May 17, Thor Heyerdahl
(1914-2002), Norwegian anthropologist, left Morocco aboard Ra II, a
papyrus reed boat, and sailed 3,270 nautical miles across the
Atlantic to Barbados in 57 days [see Jul 12].
1970 Jul 12, Thor Heyerdahl,
Norwegian ethnographer, crossed the Atlantic Ocean in "Ra" and
docked in Barbados.
1972 Jan 22, Britain, Denmark,
Ireland and Norway joined the European Economic Community.
1972 May 4, The remains of the
ship Gjoe, a converted herring boat used by Roald Amundsen to cross
the Northwest Passage (1903-1905), departed San Francisco for Oslo,
Norway. A commemorative sculpture was left next to the Beach Chalet
at Ocean Beach.
(SFC, 4/17/00, p.D8)(WSJ, 4/18/00, p.A16)(Ind,
1972 Oct 18,
In Norway Lars Korvald (1916-2006) became the first Christian
Democrat to serve as prime minister.
1973 Jul 21, Israeli
intelligence mistakenly assassinated Ahmed Bouchiki, a Moroccan
living in Lillehammer, Norway, as part of its retribution for the
Sep 5, 1972, terrorist attack in Munich. He was mistaken for Ali
Hassan Salameh (d.1979). Mossad agent Michael Harari (1927-2014)
escaped from Norway, but six Israeli agents were arrested. Five were
later convicted and sentenced one to five years in prison. Norway
later pardoned three of the agents.
1973 Oct 16,
In Norway the Christian Democrat government of Lars Korvald
(1916-2006) resigned as the socialists won a majority in
1980 Mar 27, The Alexander L.
Kielland, a North Sea Norwegian floating oil field platform,
capsized during a storm killing 123 workers. It was owned by the
Stavanger Drilling Company of Norway and was on hire to the US
company Phillips Petroleum at the time of the disaster.
1980 The 2,032 passenger SS
France became the SS Norway, flagship of the Norwegian Cruise Lines.
1981 Gro Harlem Brundtland
became prime minister of Norway.
(SFC, 6/21/96, p.A12)
1982 In 2005 Karin Linstad, a
leading Norwegian pro-Palestinian activist, said she infiltrated the
Israeli intelligence agency Mossad as a double agent in the 1980s.
The Oslo newspaper Aftenposten said Mossad had been skeptical of
Linstad's offer to act as an agent but was drawn in by her claims of
tight contact with leading Palestinians. The newspaper, without
citing sources, said she provided information about Palestinians in
Beirut, Lebanon, ahead of Israel's 1982 invasion.
