1979

1979 (MCMLXXIX) was a common year starting on Monday in the Gregorian calendar.

 Events 
 January 4 – The State of Ohio agrees to pay $675,000 to families of the dead and injured in the Kent State shootings
 February 1 – Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Tehran, Iran after nearly 15 years of exile
 March 4 – The U.S. Voyager 1 spaceprobe photos show Jupiter's rings
 April 1 – Iran's government becomes an Islamic Republic by a 98% vote, overthrowing the Shah officially
 May 1 – Greenland is given limited autonomy from Denmark. The new Parliament of Greenland will meet in Nuuk.
 June 18 – Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev sign the SALT II agreement in Vienna
 July 12 – Kiribati gains independence from the United Kingdom
 July 16 – Iraqi President Hasan al-Bakr resigns and Vice President Saddam al-Tikriti replaces him
 August 3 – Dictator Francisco Macías Nguema of Equatorial Guinea is overthrown in a bloody coup d'état led by Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo
 September 1 – The American Pioneer 11 becomes the first spacecraft to visit Saturn when it passes the planet at a distance of 21,000 km
 September 7 – The Chrysler Corporation asks the United States government for $1 billion to avoid bankruptcy
 September 7 – ESPN starts broadcasting
 September 16 – Three families flee from East Germany by balloon
 September 20 – French paratroopers help David Dacko to overthrow Bokassa
 September 22 – The South Atlantic Flash is observed near Bouvet Island, thought to be a nuclear weapons test
 October 3  The divorce of Michele Catain, an American crew member and real estate agent, and David Thomas Durboraw, an American businessman, is finalized
 October 14 – A major gay rights march in the United States takes place in Washington, DC, involving many tens of thousands of people
 October 16 – 23 people die in Nice, France, when the coastal town is hit by a tsunami
 October 21 – 259 Muslim radicals occupy Kaaba and the Grand Mosque in Mecca. Saudi-Arabian army goes in to expel them
 October 26 – South Korean president Park Chunghee killed by KCIA head Kim Jaekyu
 October 27 – Saint Vincent and the Grenadines gains independence
 October 29 – Pope John Paul II visits Ireland
 November 5 – The radio news program Morning Edition premieres on National Public Radio in the United States
 December 5 – Jack Lynch resigns as Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland. He is succeeded by Charles Haughey.
 December 15 – Chris Haney and Scott Abbott develop the board game Trivial Pursuit
 December 26  The divorce of Jack Catain Jr., an American businessman, and Marlene Noble, an American apparel sales associate, is finalized

 Births 
 January 2 – Morena Baccarin, Brazilian actress
 January 12 – Marián Hossa, Slovakian hockey player
 January 16 – Aaliyah, American singer (d. 2001)
 January 20 – Will Young, English singer and actor
 January 26 – Sara Rue, American actress
 February 9 – Irina Slutskaya, Russian figure skater
 February 11 – Brandy Norwood, American singer
 February 21 – Jennifer Love Hewitt, American actress
 March 8 – Tom Chaplin, English singer (Keane)
 March 9 – Melina Perez, American wrestler
 March 12 – Pete Doherty, English musician
 March 27 – Hiromu Shinozuka, Japanese manga artist
 April 4
 Heath Ledger, Australian actor (d. 2008)
 Roberto Luongo, Canadian hockey player
 April 5 – Timo Hildebrand, German footballer
 April 24 – Marie Picasso, Swedish model and singer
 May 9 – Pierre Bouvier, Canadian musician
 May 15 – Dominic Scott, Irish guitarist
 May 16 – Prince Carl Philip of Sweden
 May 21 – Shinya Kumazaki, Japanese video game developer
 May 26 – Ashley Massaro, American model and wrestler
 May 29 – Arne Friedrich German footballer
 August 3 – Evangeline Lilly, Canadian actress
 August 16 – Cleo Lemon, American NFL player
 September 13 – Manuel Friedrich, German footballer
 September 17 – Chuck Comeau, Canadian musician
 September 27 – Shep Rose, American
 October 1 - Florin Salam, Romanian singer 
 October 3 – John Hennigan, American wrestler
 October 8 – Kristanna Loken, American actress
 November 14 – Michael Owen, English footballer
 November 27 – Hilary Hahn, American violinist
 December 4 - Adrian Zandberg, Polish politician, historian, and programmer. He created the Razem political party
 December 25 - Ferman Akgül, Turkish songwriter and singer
 December 26 – Chris Daughtry, American singer

 Deaths 
 January
 January 3 – Conrad Hilton, American hotelier  (b. 1887)
 January 5 – Charles Mingus, American bassist (b. 1922)
 January 16 – Ted Cassidy, American actor  (b. 1932)
 January 18 – Gaston Heuet, French long-distance runner (b. 1892)
 January 26 – Nelson Rockefeller, 41st Vice President of the United States (b. 1908)
 January 27 – Victoria Ocampo, Argentine writer (b. 1890)

 February 
 February 2 – Sid Vicious, English musician (b. 1957)
 February 7 – Josef Mengele, Nazism war criminal (b. 1911)
 February 8 – Nikolai Tikhonov, Soviet writer (b. 1896)
 February 9 – Dennis Gabor, Hungarian-British engineer (b. 1900)
 February 12 – Jean Renoir, French film director (b. 1894)
 February 17 – William Gargan, American actor (b. 1905)

 March 
 March 1 – Mustafa Barzani, Kurdish leader (b. 1903)
 March 7 – Klaus Egge, Norwegian nationalist (b. 1906)
 March 15 – Alexandre Parodi, French Politician (b. 1901)
 March 30 – José María Velasco Ibarra, 24th President of Ecuador (b. 1893)

 April 
 April 4 – Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, 4th President of Pakistan (b. 1928)

 May 
 May 1 – Morteza Motahhari, Iranian philosopher (b. 1919)
 May 2 – Giulio Natta, Italian chemical engineer (b. 1903)
 May 9 – Gabriel Ramanantsoa, 2nd President of Madagascar (b. 1906)
 May 29 – Mary Pickford, Canadian-American actress (b. 1892)

 June 
 June 11 – John Wayne, American actor (b. 1907)

 July 
 July 3 – Louis Durey, French composer (b. 1988)
 July 8 – Shin'ichirō Tomonaga, Japanese physicist (b. 1906)
 July 15 – Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, 49th President of Mexico (b. 1911)

 August 
 August 3 – Bertil Ohlin, Swedish economist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1899)
 August 21 – Giuseppe Meazza, Italian football player (b. 1910)
 August 27 – Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, British statesman and naval officer (b. 1900)

 September 
 September 10 – Agostinho Neto, 1st President of Angola (b. 1922)
 September 20 – Ismail Nasiruddin of Terengganu, 4th Yang di-Pertuan Agong (b. 1907)
 September 28 – John Herbert Chapman, Canadian physicist (b. 1921)
 September 29 – Francisco Macías Nguema, 1st President of Equatorial Guinea (executed) (b. 1924)

 October 
 October 1 – Preguinho, Brazilian footballer (b. 1905)
 October 8 – Nur Muhammad Taraki, President of Afghanistan (b. 1917)
 October 26 – Park Chung-hee, President of South Korea (b. 1917)

 November 
 November 1 – Mamie Eisenhower, First Lady of the United States (b. 1896)
 November 25 – Ky Ebright, American Olympic rowing coach (b. 1894)

 December 
 December 27 – Hafizullah Amin, President of Afghanistan (b. 1929)

 Nobel Prizes 
 Nobel Prize in Physics shared by Sheldon Lee Glashow, Abdus Salam, and Steven Weinberg for their work on electroweak interactions
 Nobel Prize in Chemistry shared by Herbert C. Brown and Georg Wittig for their work with organoboranes
 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine shared by Allan McLeod Cormack and Godfrey N. Hounsfield for their work on X-ray computed tomography
 Nobel Prize in Literature won by Odysseas Elytis, Greek poet
 Nobel Peace Prize won by Mother Teresa
 Nobel Prize in Economics – Theodore Schultz, American economist, and W. Arthur Lewis, Saint Lucian economist