What was going on when I was born?

An article Saturday incorrectly identified th e Human Resources Ad- ministrator w ho assigned an inv esti- gation into a suspicious fire to the In- spector General's office rather than to the Bureau of Client Fraud Investigation. It was the former administrator, Stanley Brezenoff.

It surprised no one here during a scholarly three-day conference on Dwight D. Eisenhower that he seems in retrospect a more skillful and attractive statesman than he appeared to many intellectuals during the 1950's and early 60's. For one thing, the academics had convened at Eisenhower College - which is an official national memorial to the 34th President - for an occasion billed as ''a celebration.'' For another, a revisionist version of Eisenhower - shrewd, commanding, constant and, above all, a man of peace - has been taking shape for more than 10 years among liberal journalists and historians and has quickened in the last year. And so they came here from around the country - historians, political scientists and former Presidential advisers on arms and intelligence. They talked about Eisenhower. He died in 1969, soon after the private college that bears his name opened its doors. He would have turned 91 on Wednesday.

UP on the Grand Concourse, the thick, gray Bronx County Courthouse towers above the facade of the Yankee Stadium bleachers. But for Rick Cerone, the two landmarks are interchangeable. Even though the 27-year-old catcher hit a home run last night as the Yankees advanced to the American League championship series against the Oakland A's, he remains on trial in George Steinbrenner's courtroom, where the principal owner is both the judge in a powdered wig and the executioner in a hangman's hood. ''If we lost,'' Rick Cerone was saying at his locker, ''It might have been my last game as a Yankee.'' If the Yankees lose the last game to the A's this week, or if they lose the last game of the World Series, that may turn out to be Rick Cerone's last game as a Yankee, too.

Thirty years ago Abdullah al-Salim al-Sabah, the Emir of the British Prot e ctorate of Kuwait, signed a new royalty agreement with the Kuwait Oi l Company, the British- and American-owned enterprise that dominate d the Kuwaiti oil scene. Soon he was receiving more than$2.5 million a week. Within a year the British Foreign Office dispatched a high-ranking official to help determine how Kuwait could invest the Emir's vast wealth outside the sheikdom without causing foreign policy problems. Today the British are gone, Emir Jaber al-Ahmed al-Sabah reigns over an independent nation and the oil company has been nationalized. However, with oil revenues pouring into Kuwaiti coffers last year at the rate of $290 million a week, according to a Bankers Trust estimate, both the need to invest abroad and foreign fears about the impact of such investments loom larger than ever.

Steve Rogers outpitched Steve Carlton today for the second time in a week as the Montreal Expos defeated the Philadelphia Phillies, 3-0, and won the National League's Eastern championship. It was the first division title for Canada since the Expos joined the major leagues 13 years ago, and they won it by eliminating the team that took the pennant and the World Series one year ago. They also won it only five weeks after dismissing Dick Williams as manager and replacing him with Jim Fanning, a vice president of the club who had never managed a team in the major leagues. But the most remarkable achievement for the Expos was probably their consecutive victories over Carlton, the fourth-ranking strikeout pitcher in history and three times the winner of the Cy Young Award as the league's best.

Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. said today that the United States was ready to speed up the delivery of arms to Egypt and would take part in a ''very extensive joint exercise'' with Egyptian forces next month. The steps are part of emergency action to insure the security of the region in the wake of the assassination of President Anwar el-Sadat. Mr. Haig's remarks were made as Cairo was swept by reports of continuing violence around the country. One of the reports, attributed to police sources, said gunmen had attacked the home of the Interior Minister, killing a number of bodyguards. The minister, Nabawe Ismail, said the report was ''completely a lie.'' (Page A8.)

Executives of the nation's biggest companies spoke of brighter days for the United States economy at a meeting here of the Business Council, but underlying their sunny disposition was pessimism about the near term. And Administration officials, who came to urge corporate America to hasten investment, found many executives not yet ready to commit large amounts of money for capital spending, despite the largest tax cut in history, which was intended to encourage new investment. Slow Response ''We are now seeing an attempt to turn a very large ship in the water,'' said Walter B. Wriston, chairman of Citicorp and the president of the Business Council, referring to President Reagan's economic program. ''But it takes about five miles for a supertanker to respond to the rudder. I don't think anyone can tell you how it's going to operate until you get out six or eight months.''

Confronted with management assertions that jobs, plants and perhaps the viability of industries are at stake, labor unions are agreeing at what appears to be a record rate to reopen contracts and to accept reduced wages and benefits for their members. Unions in the automobile, steel, rubber, newspaper, meat packing, farm implement, automobile supply, mining, smelting, railroad and airline industries have agreed to significant concessions in wages and benefits. Teachers' unions, public transit unions and grocery workers' unions have agreed to major concessions. Last month, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters agreed to reopen negotiations on the master freight agreement, which covers 300,000 drivers at 3,000 trucking companies. From now to the end of 1982, with the economy in severe difficulty, major negotiations are scheduled. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, for example, is due to negotiate in 1982 for 155,000 workers in Baltimore, Boston, Buffalo, Memphis, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Toledo and New York. The New York municipal negotiations, also involving other unions, will determine wages and benefits for 225,000 city employees, including transit workers, police and correction officers, firefighters and teachers.

International Arms deliveries to Egypt will be stepped up, Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. said in Cairo, adding that the United States will take part in a ''very extensive'' joint security exercise with Egyptian forces next month. Mr. Haig expressed confidence in President-designate Hosni Mubarak but said that American officials felt that Egypt and the neighboring Sudan would be vulnerable to outside interference in the coming months. (Page A1, Column 6.) A U.S.-P.L.O. dialogue is critical to a lasting peace in the Middle East, former Presidents Gerald R. Ford and Jimmy Carter said during an interview aboard an Air Force jet returning from Cairo. But both former Presidents stressed that the Palestine Liberation Organization would have to agree to accommodations with Israel. The former Presidents, together with former President Richard M. Nixon, were part of the American delegation to the funeral of President Anwar el-Sadat. (A1:4.)

The Soviet Union, in an unusual ''statement to the Government of the United States,'' said today that events in Egypt affect Soviet security and accused Washington of applying ''gross'' and ''unlawful'' pressures on that country. The strongl y worded communique was the first official Soviet statement on Egyptian affairs since the assassination of President Anwar el-Sada t last Tuesday. However, it did not mention the assassination .

Bus drivers on the Brooklyn route where a fellow worker was shot dead Saturday by a passenger whose request for a transfer he had refused said yesterday that they were often threatened and harassed in such disputes. As detectives combed the Sheepshead Bay section for the assailant, other drivers said that, unlike the victim, they handed out transfers without regard for Transit Authority rules because they wanted to protect themselves from volatile people. A Word of Caution ''You just look and see who it is first,'' said Martin Greenstein, a driver at the Flatbush Avenue depot where the dead man, 27-year-old Harvey Shild, worked. ''Some people you can talk to; some people you can't say 'boo' to. You're dead before you start.''

Although Egypt's new leader, Hosni Mubarak, has made every effort since the death of President Anwar el-Sadat to convey a sense of continuity and calm in Egypt, the nation is nevertheless experiencing unease and foreboding. Whether Mr. Mubarak, who has spent the last several days accepting condolences and arranging the funeral service for Mr. Sadat, can erase those distress signals remains to be seen. Until late today, even as the last of the foreign dignitaries who came for Mr. Sadat's funeral left Egypt, Mr. Mubarak was still assuring othe r nations, particularly the United States, that Egypt would remain stable. He said that he was dedicated to implementing Mr. Sadat's p olicies, most notably the furthering of the peace process with Israel.