Chronicles: 1970 Year In Review

The best thing to emerge from 1970 is unquestionably the XY GT Falcon, unless of course you were born that year...

Alfa were to replace the extremely popular 1750 with the GTV2000, unfortunately this would be the last of the line of this truely great sports coupe...

The public saw the first "luxury" Land Rover in 1970, and it became an instant hit with many. The four door "Rangie" would take a further 2 years to enter production...

G. Gabelich was to claim the land speed record in 1970 at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, USA. And the speed?, a whopping 1000.78 km/h!

1970 would deliver the legend of the XY GT, and the Lemon of the Morris Marina...

The Montreal was undeniably Alfa's jewel in the crown...

The Beatles topped the charts in 1970 with their hit "Let It Be"...

Large Moratorium marches throughout the country would lead to Australia slowly decreasing its committment to Vietnam, starting with the removal of the 8th Battalion in November, 1970...

The Mighty Falcon XY GTHO

1970 was a time of conservative politics, with Sir John Grey Gorton as PM and Australia still prospering. Thankfully the fuel crisis was still a few years away, otherwise we may have never seen the emergence of arguably the best Falcon GT to date - the mighty XY GTHO.

The fitting of seat belts to new motor vehicles became mandatory in 1970, but it would take a further 2 years for the government to legislate to make it mandatory for both driver and passengers to wear them. Indeed, 1970 can be considered the year the authorities became serious about reducing the road toll.

While this site is far from being an advocate of the ridiculous "speed camera" revenue mantra adopted by many State Governments, the improvements in vehicle safety, driver education and the quality of Australian roads (although still deplorable by world standards) has seen the road toll for 1999 decline to be less than half that of 1970!

A Luxury Land Rover

While development of a "luxury" Land Rover commenced in 1966, it was not until 1970 that the public had their first glimpse of the new luxury 4X4. Using Rover's 3.5 litre V8 engine was undoubtedly the reason for the success, as four wheel drives had been, until then, utalitarian in nature and had traded power for torque, usually by way of an underpowered 4 cylinder engine.

The Range Rover was a unique vehicle, combining excellent off-road abilities and refined around town manners - it quickly becoming a status-symbol of the affluent that remains to this day. Interestingly, it remains as the only vehicle to have been exhibited in the Louvre as a work of art.

However not everything to come out of the UK was golden. BMC were losing market share to the Ford Cortina and Holden Torana, and realised they needed a new mid sized car to replace their rapidly aging designs. And thus evolved the Marina, although using the word "evolve" is overstating it a little. Using running gear dating back to 1948, designers reasoned that the "all new" Marina would be accepted by the public by way of knowing its technology was tried and tested.

Tried and Tested it may have been, but the appaling build quality was to become the main reason anyone would talk about the Marina - and non existant trade in valuations were soon to follow.

While BMC seemed to be hitting an all-time low, Italy's Alfa Romeo was to launch one of the finest cars of that decade, the highly sought after Montreal. With aggressive styling by Bertone, the car featured a delightful 2.6 litre V8 offering plenty of performance, but being so light as to give the car the feeling of being mid-engined.

But many Journalists were disappointed with the Montreal, lamenting the fact that Alfa had not gone the extra step and made the Montreal a genuine mid-engined supercar - particularly given Alfa's astronomical asking price.

So for devotees of the marque, the real news of 1970 was in the replacement of the wonderful 1750GTV with the 2000GTV. The new model carried over the wonderful styling and interior, but now offered better performance from a larger 2 litre motor.

While the Beatles topped the charts in 1970 with "Let It Be", Australians were to slowly adopt a wonderful new fashion sence, wonderful that is if you liked platform shoes, wide ties and even wider lapels. The "Safari Suit" would soon become our adopted National Uniform.

And 1970 was unfortunately not without tradgedy. While many journalists refer to the Boxing Day 2004 Tsunami as the worst natural disaster in living memory, surely the cyclone and resultant tidal wave that killed over 500,000 people in Eastern Pakistan on November 12 1970 could be considered even more devastating?

Back home, 1970 was the year an up and coming R.J. (Bob) Hawke would succeed Albert Monk as president of the ACTU. The International Terminal was at last opened at Sydney's Sir Charles Kingsford Smith Airport, and Melbourne's new Tullamarine Airport took over from the aging Essendon Airport.

On November 12th, the Australian 8th Battalion was to return from Vietnam - and they were not replaced, no doubt due to the large Moratorium marches being held throughout the country.

Graham Kennedy decided to retire from GTV9 in 1970, only to return two years later. But perhaps the biggest news on TV from that year was at the studio's of HSV7, where their new Saturday night variety show "The Penthouse Club" was launched. The show featured a mixture of variety, comedy, harness racing coverage and Tattslotto. It was to run until 1979.

On the 18th April, VFL Park was officially opened, with Fitzroy and Geelong contesting the first match. Come finals time, it was traditional rivals Carlton and Collingwood that would line up in the Grand Final, in front of the biggest crowd ever at a sporting event.

Collingwood were to lead for the first 3 quarters, but in an incredible and gutsy comeback Carlton were able to finish strongly as the Collingwood players ran out of fresh legs. Jump forward 35 years and little remains of "Waverley", the site now developed as a housing estate - Collingwood are not fairing much better...

Formula One Championship: Jochen Rindt (Austria) / Lotus-Ford

1970 Bathurst Winner: Allan Moffat / XW Falcon GTHO

NRL Grand Final: South Sydney (23) def. Manly-Warringah (12)

VFL/AFL Grand Final: Carlton (17.9.111) def. Collingwood (14.17.101)

Melbourne Cup: Baghdad Note (E. J. Didham)

Wimbledon Women: Margaret Court d. B.J. King (14-12 11-9)

Wimbledon Men: John Newcombe d. K. Rosewall (5-7 6-3 6-2 3-6 6-1)

The Movies: