What was going on when I was born?

The United States Steel Corporation, the nation's largest steel producer, reported yesterday that its second-quarter earnings declined 25.9 percent, to $111.5 million.

WASHINGTON, July 29 (AP)--A broadly based rise in exports pushed United States sales overseas to a record level in June and cut the nation's trade deficit to $2.28 billion from $3.96 billion in May, the Commerce Department reported today.

Faced with slumping demand, at least three major oil companies have lowered crude oil prices in recent days, marking the first broad reduction in prices since the mid-1960's. Other companies are expected to follow.

New York City and its environs were drenched yesterday by a rainstorm that paralyzed the subway system, snarled traffic and transformed the usually mad morning rush hour into something resembling a natural disaster.

SANGRIA, gazpacho and paella are popular Spanish specialties all over the world, and Americans have come to associate them with summers at the beach or holidays in Spain. Paella, a combination of seafood and meats cooked with rice, is especially appropriate for summer entertaining not only because of its distinctive flavor but also because it is visually attractive and quite simple to prepare.

WASHINGTON, July 29--President Carter, making his first direct public statement on the controversy surrounding his brother, said today that he was "eager to respond in person" to questions from the Senate committee investigating Billy Carter's dealings with Libya.

Detectives investigating last week's murder of a violinist at the Metropolitan Opera House have prepared a sketch of a man who was seen in an elevator with the victim moments before she disappeared, police sources said yesterday.

ANOTHER of my favorite bons vivants, the writer A.J. Liebling, was of the opinion that the rich man, not because he is necessarily stupid but because wealth has made him complacent, "is almost doomed to be a dilettante at table."

PALO ALTO, Calif., July 29--Cells like "tiny little factories" that produce pure human antibodies, the body's first line of defense against disease, have been developed at Stanford University Medical School, researchers reported today.

UNITED NATIONS, N.Y., July 29.-- Third-world nations and the Soviet bloc joined today to approve overwhelmingly a fresh call for the formation of a Palestinian state.

"What difference does it make what black people do," said Larry Dee Dunkin, an unemployed 19-year-old black youth, as he strolled past crumbling buildings on Rockaway Avenue in the Ocean HillBrownsville section of Brooklyn.