What was going on when I was born?

New York State will have to provide help if the Rangers hockey team and the Knickerbockers basketball team are to be kept in New York City, according to the city's Corporation Counsel. The counsel, Allen G. Schwartz, is the city's negotiator in talks with Madison Square Garden aimed at keeping the teams in New York City. A variety of approaches, including governmental takeover of the arena, are being discussed. ''We've got to get the state to come forward,'' Mr. Schwartz said. Mayor Koch said separately that the Gulf & Western Corporation, which owns the Garden, would have to share the burden, as would the labor unions whose members work there.

Of all the ills afflicting the human race, none seems more soluble - and at the same time more intractable - than hunger. On the one hand, enough grain is produced now to provide every man, woman and child on earth with some 3,000 calories a day. That is more than the average level of consumption in the United States and about 50 percent above what is now considered to be a minimum acceptable level of caloric consumption. On the other hand, chronic malnutrition persists, often in countries where plenty of food is available, such as in India and Brazil. Uncertainty as to Numbers There is widespread uncertainty as to the actual number of malnourished people. But no one challenges the fact that a minimum of 100 million to 200 million people, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Southeast Asia, are severely malnourished, in the sense that they do not have the energy to function normally. Hundreds of millions more would eat better, and possible more, if they could, nutritionists maintain.

The biggest snowstorm since early 1978 dumped up to two feet of snow on New England today, closing the Boston airport for most of the day, shutting off power to 92,000 people and causing at least three deaths. About 200 people were stranded on Nantucket Island, where they had traveled Saturday to take part in an annual Christmas shopping festival. High winds and rough seas prevented the use of the only ferry boat to the mainland and shut the island's airport temporarily. The National Weather Service here said the surprise snowstorm, blown by winds of up to 50 miles an hour, was the worst early winter storm since Dec. 5, 1926, and the biggest since the blizzard in February 1978 that paralyzed the Middle West and the Northeast with up to 40 inches of snow.

In this sprawling steel city, the slogan ''City of Champions'' has replaced ''Steel City'' as the preferred motto of the Chamber of Commerce. Local businessmen are now apt to direct a visitor's attention to the rash of modern downtown development rather than to the famous steel mills strung along the Monongahela River. And employees of the United States Steel Corporation, for many the cornerstone of this city's identity, can be seen at corporate headquarters here wearing Marathon Oil buttons pinned to their lapels. Despite the attempts to change this city's self-image, some here are still less than comfortable with Big Steel's $6.5 billion offer for the nation's 17th-largest oil company. ''It goes a long way in diluting the role steel has had in Pittsburgh,'' said Robert F. Sekerka, head of the metallurgy department at Carnegie-Mellon University.

Representative Frederick W. Richmond of Brooklyn announced yesterday that he was reviewing his $100,000 outside annual income ''to make sure I am fully complying with all rules of the House Ethics Committee.'' Mr. Richmond's statement, issued through his attorney, followed a ruling by a Federal judge in St. Louis that the 58-year-old Democratic Congressman had ''feigned'' retirement from a manufacturing company to collect the $100,000 annually as a pension. House ethics rules limit Congressmen to earned outside income of 15 percent of their Federal salary, or about $9,600 a year. Before Mr. Richmond formally relinquished the chairmanship of the company in 1978, he said, he had obtained a letter from the House Ethics Committee acknowledging that payment for past services, such as a pension, was not considered earned income.

Past and present leaders of the National Governors Association met here this weekend and agreed that an era of severe restraints on public services is ahead. They also said that state officials would be chiefly responsible for reaching an accommodation with the public on the use of declining resources. ''The Federal Government is doing nothing to help clarify the proper roles of the state and Federal governments,'' the Governors said after their discussions. ''In fact, its economic program may tend to get in the way of the clarification of roles and responsibilities.''

The brokers and securities analysts at the annual meeting of the Securities Industry Association, who packed up their resort wear and gulf clubs here on Friday in preparation for a return to pinstripes and briefcases, were a troubled lot. The common front that this diverse group has long maintained on the issue of keeping banks out of the securities business had cracked, leaving a deeply divided industry. The catalyst for the rift was the announcement last month by two big California banks that they hoped to engage in functions that have traditionally been the exclusive preserve of the securities industry. The two - the BankAmerica Corporation, owner of the Bank of America, the largest bank in the United States, and the Security Pacific National Bank, the nation's ninth-largest commercial bank - said they planned to enter stock trading by linking with discount brokerage firms.

International Muammar el-Qaddafi denied plotting to assassinate President Reagan or anyone else in an interview from Tripoli televised by ABC News. ''We are sure we haven't sent any people to kill Reagan or any other people in the world,'' said the Libyan leader. In Washington, the State Department responded with a statement that it had evidence of such plans, saying that ''Qaddafi has been planning the murder of American officials both here and overseas.'' (Page A1, Column 5.) Solidarity was again warned of a confrontation with the Government, which accused the union's leadership of breaking its agreements and refusing to negotiate for a national accord, choosing instead ''a road that may bring about confrontation.'' Nevertheless, Solidarity's Warsaw regional organization voted to call for a day of protest on Dec. 17 against the raid last Wednesday by policemen, backed by army units, on a firefighers' academy in Warsaw, breaking up a sit-in by cadets. (A1:4.)

For Thanksgiving this year, the New York Bank for Savings gave out special bonuses of up to $300 to each of its employees earning $30,000 a year or less. This was probably the last such bonus from the bank. The bank's employees already have been told that they will not get Christmas bonuses, which in the past ranged up to $1,000 each. And the bank has stopped its savings incentive plan, through which it had matched the savings of some of its employees.

''It's a gold mine. We can see the green falling.'' - Russ Perry, ski resort operator, on the snowstorm.

Purchasing agents at many of the leading industrial companies in the United States believe that the economy is sliding deeper into recession but still has a long way to go before it hits bottom, according to the November survey of the National Association of Purchasing Management. ''The downward turn in the economy reported in September, which continued lower in October, worsened in November,'' said the association's latest report, which was released yesterday. ''A recession,'' concluded the report, which surveyed purchasing agents at 225 major industrial concerns, ''is definitely upon us.'' The survey is regarded as an indication of future economic trends, since today's purchasing orders are a factor in determining the strength of tomorrow's economy.

The economy is sliding deeper into recession, but still has a long way to go before reaching bottom, the National Association of Purchasing Management said in its latest monthly survey. The members, who are the executives who buy goods and services for the nation's businesses, also said that falling prices from suppliers indicated more downward pressure on inflation. (Page D1.)