The King is dead
Elvis Presley, who had left the rock 'n' roll generation all shook up, died in the bathroom of his Graceland mansion in Memphis, Tennessee, on August 16, 1977. He was 42, hugely overweight, thanks to an addiction to junk food, and heavily reliant on prescription drugs.
In spite of persistent rumours that his death was faked, only his spirit has lived on, and very successfully. His music continues to be played, sold, downloaded, remixed and rediscovered to such an extent that Elvis topped a 2001 Forbes magazine list of the richest dead celebrities...
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Queen of Wimbledon
Virginia Wade marked the Queen's Jubilee year by winning the 1977 Wimbledon ladies singles title. She is still the last British tennis player to win a singles title at Wimbledon and was the last British player to win any senior Wimbledon trophy until Jamie Murray won the mixed doubles with Jelena Jankovic in 2007.
Elsewhere in sport Red Rum galloped to a record third Grand National victory. The race also featured the first woman rider. In spite of dire predictions Charlotte Brew, 21, almost completed the course.
Her horse, Barony Fort, refused the fourth fence from home forcing Ms Brew to pull out of the race.
In football, Manchester United manager Tommy Docherty hit the headlines when he was sacked after if was discovered he was having an affair with the wife fo the club's physio. 1977 also saw Kerry Packer transform cricket by signing up a host of top players, including England captain Tony Greig, for his 'circus'. Greig and the others were tempted by salaries of up to £12,000 a year...
Sex Pistols Jubilant
In 1977 The Sex Pistols were sacked by EMI, then by A&M but by June they had joined Virgin and sold 150,000 copies of God Save the Queen in just one day.
The single officially reached number two - despite being banned by Â鶹Éç Radio One and several other stations and several high street chains refusing to stock it.
It caused an outrage in the year of the Queen's Jubilee.
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Meanwhile on TOTP...
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The punk explosion may have been at its height but in the charts the skirl of pipes gave Paul McCartney the biggest hit of the year as Mull of Kintyre topped the pops for nine weeks. David Soul, aka Hutch in Starsky and Hutch, had hits with Silver Lady and Don't Give Up on Us, Kenny Rogers brought us Lucille and Julie Covington made the charts with Don't Cry for Me Argentina.
Gary Gilmore's eyes
A 10 year pause in executions ended in the USA when Gary Gilmore, a convicted murderer, was killed by firing squad in the Utah state prison in Salt Lake City.Ìý The death penalty had been controversially reinstated the year before and Gilmore fought the justice system to ensure he would be executed quickly.
Within an hour of having a restraining order on the execution overturned Gary Gilmore was dead. After the legal order had been read, Gilmore's last words were: "Let's do it."
Two people received Gilmore's corneas within hours of his death - which inspired punk band the Adverts' Top 20 hit Gary Gilmore's Eyes.
In a cinema far, far away
On the big screen, the force was with us as Stars Wars opened with a cast of unknowns and went on to become one of the most popular films of all time. Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Saturday Night Fever had already been big hits that year.
In an era before the big multiplexes it could take some time before these big movies reached the diminishing number of screens in Northern Ireland.
Power to the cock-up
On TV, Wolfie Smith, leader of the Tooting Popular Front and played by Robert Lindsay, was in charge of providing the laughs in Citizen Smith while Denis Norden introduced the famous and the unknown cocking up in front of the camera on It'll Be Alright on the Night. Honestly, it was funny the first time. No, really.
Former UTV presenter Gordon Burns also started a long-running series when he hosted ITV's Krypton Factor, which involved completing oversized jigsaws, playing a grown-up version of 'I spy', and hurtling across an army assault course, Gladiators-style. The show ran for another 18 years.