What was going on when I was born?

Reporter's notebook: Two faces of Argentina A2 Forty-three people die in wind storms in Brazil A3 Bitter cost of Falkland war comes home to Argentines A3 Salvador audit faults land redistribution program A3 3,000 Poles mark anniversary of 1956 Poznan rioting A4 Yugoslav's first priority is the economy A5 A coup attempt in Iran is reportedly thwarted A6 Arab foreign ministers fail to reach agreement A6 Around the World A7 Pravda says Haig was made a scapegoat A11 Government/Politics Study finds all-volunteer armed services racially imbalanced A12 Special prosecutor plans to issue Donovan findings A12 City says it will replenish dwindling Staten Island lake B1 Excerpts from Kennedy speech at Democratic Party parley B6 Women's issues are in forefront at Democratic conference B7 Washington Talk Staff of House Armed Services panel has unusual power A13 Calendar A13 Briefing A13 Required Reading A13 General Around the Nation A12 Butte's love-hate relationship with copper pit is almost over A12 At least 2 killed as small plane crashes in L.I. Sound B2 Mensa holds its annual international gathering B2 Jocularity and resolve mark homosexual-pride march B3 Doctors are divided in opinion of cause of athlete's death B9 SportsMonday Baseball: Yanks send Righetti to Columbus for special coaching C1 Indians beat Yankees, 4-3 C4 Mets lose fifth in row to Phillies, 8-3 C5 Palmer of Expos stops Pirates, 5-2 C5 Brewers beat Red Sox, 7-5, and cut lead to 2 games C4 Hopes and arms are nurtured on Mets' Tidewater farm team C5 Basketball: Worthy is likely No. 1 choice in N.B.A. draft C1 Columns: Dave Anderson on Souchak's 27-year golf mark C6 George Vecsey on a bitter taste in soccer's World Cup C3 Features: Sports World Specials C2 Question Box C9 Football: How medical expert spots players on drugs C9 Golf: Gilder wins at Westchester by 5 shots on 69-261 C1 Pros defend Westchester course after low scoring C6 Sandra Haynie is Rochester victor by six strokes Someone else's poorhouse A fundamental confusion Tax loss in Trenton Vengeance won't rule waves Letters A14 William Safire: Secretary Haig's last lunch A15 Anthony Lewis: at the edge of disaster A15 Yirmiyahu Yovel: Begin, offer a peace branch A15 Irving Kristol: muddled thinking on the Middle East A15 Amitai Etzioni: prematurely burying our industrial society A15

Bob Gilder walked away with the Manufacturers Hanover Westchester Classic today by a five-stroke margin. His total of 19-under-par 261 for four rounds was the lowest score on the PGA Tour since Johnny Miller shot 260 in the 1975 Phoenix Open. Gilder also broke the Westchester Classic record of 269, also by Miller, in 1974 when the par was 72. Toward the end, Gilder said, he was emotionally drained from the excitement of winning and from the double-eagle 2 he had made Saturday, and from a cold he was battling. All he wanted to do, he said, ''was to get in without tripping over my own feet.''

Orders for new machine tools fell 56.7 percent in May from their level a year earlier, the National Machine Tool Builders Association said yesterday. The decline indicates that companies are pessimistic about the prospects for an economic recovery in the third quarter, analysts said. Because of the lag before delivery, companies generally order new tools several months before they expect to need them. ''The month of May was an absolute disaster,'' said Eli S. Lustgarten, an analyst with Paine, Webber, Mitchell Hutchins Inc. ''Conditions have not stabilized and most corporations are still in the process of scaling back their capital spending plans.''

The Israeli Cabinet issued a peace plan for Lebanon today, calling for the Lebanese Army to enter west Beirut and for the Palestine Liberation Organization to lay down its arms and leave the country along the Beirut-Damascus highway. Israel guaranteed safe passage for the P.L.O.'s members and leaders. The six-point proposal, designed to accomplish Israel's most ambitious goals in the war while avoiding an all-out Israeli assault on Palestinian strongholds in west Beirut, had the tone of an ultimatum. It began with an Israeli pledge to observe the current cease-fire, but warned that any violation would cause a military response ''with full severity.''

''Enough, enough.'' - Nadia Haddad of Beirut. (A1:6.)

If there were anything for Dave Righetti to say as he packed his belongings early yesterday morning, he could not find the words. Less than six hours before, he had been the starting pitcher for the Yankees, struggling to show management the type of performances that had made him the American League rookie of the year last season. Shortly after 1 A.M. yesterday, Righetti again was a minor league player, struggling to hold back tears as clubhouse helpers packed his bags for an unexpected trip. Righetti was sent to Columbus, the Yankee farm team in the International League, at the direction of George Steinbrenner, the Yankee principal owner, to work with Sammy Ellis, the pitching coach there, and improve a record considered unsatisfactory by Steinbrenner. When reached by telephone last night in Manhattan, Righetti said he had no hint the demotion was coming. ''Earlier, I was terrible,'' he said. ''I might have thought about something then. Since then, I dropped my e.r.a. 100 points, I was third in the league in strikeouts, the American League was only hitting .210 against me, or .212. I thought I was going the right way.''

Despite its failure to win ratification of the proposed Federal equal rights amendment, the women's movement has emerged from the 10-year struggle with a strong political organization that, its leaders say, will now work to elect more women to public office. ''The major political result of the E.R.A. fight has been the politicization of women,'' said Kathy Wilson, director of the National Women's Political Caucus. ''We can no longer be standing on the outside wringing our hands over every roll-call vote. We have got to get women in office.'' Similar views have been widely expressed by other leaders of the movement since it became apparent a few days ago that the proposed amendment would fail to be ratified by the required three-fourths of the state legislatures before the June 30 deadline. The National Organization for Women, the chief supporter of the measure, announced Thursday that it had given up the fight.

George P. Shultz, the Secretary of Statedesignate, will bring to the State Department a broad range of experience in economic affairs that is likely to spread his influence far beyond the normal reach of the office. His experience as Secretary of the Treasury and as director of the Office of Management and Budget in the Nixon Administration and his rapport with President Reagan point to a broad role for Mr. Shultz. This seems especially true because so many ''diplomatic'' issues have become ''economic'' issues as well, such as embargoes on technology, intervention in foreign-exchange markets to adjust the international value of the dollar and protectionist issues in foreign trade. To his calling as an adviser on many issues, Mr. Shultz can bring a mixture of conservative economic ideas tempered with a practicality that led him, during the 1980 Presidential campaign, to overshadow the economist Arthur Laffer, an ardent but controversial supplysider often cited by opponents trying to discredit Mr. Reagan's economic strategy.

Is New Jersey in economic trouble these days or is it riding out the recession quite nicely, thank you? The answer depends on whom you talk to - and perhaps where you look. ''You know all those dire things I said about the economy in the campaign?'' said Governor Kean. ''Well, it turns out they're true.'' ''New Jersey,'' said Samuel M. Ehrenhalt, the regional commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, ''is very much in the heart of the recession.'' The state's unemployment rate, according to the bureau, stood at 9.2 percent in May, unchanged from April. By comparison, the rate was 8.1 percent for New York State in May and 9.5 percent nationally. Dr. William C. Freund, chief economist for the New York Stock Exchange and a member of New Jersey's Economic Policy Council, sees it differently. ''The state is doing remarkably well,'' he said in a recent interview. ''The impact of the recession has been extremely mild.''

The United States has told Israel that it supports an end to the Palestine Liberation Organization's military presence in west Beirut but that barring major provocations, Washington will not countenance further military activity against the city, Administration officials said today. A high State Department official said, however, that despite the Israeli Cabinet's affirmation today of the cease-fire in Lebanon, the United States has been advising Saudi Arabia and other Governments with influence on the P.L.O. that it cannot guarantee that Israel will adhere to the truce much longer unless the Palestinians surrender their arms. The official said the United States was basing its efforts to end the Palestinian military presence in Lebanon not on Israeli policy but on public statements made by the Lebanese Government at the United Nations and at the Arab League meeting in Tunis today. He said Lebanon had received significant support in Tunis from other Arab nations for its demand that the P.L.O. forces lay down their arms and end their military presence in Lebanon.

The space shuttle Columbia rocketed back into space today carrying its first military and commercial payloads and seeking to establish the re-usable spaceship's credentials for regular orbital operations. The Columbia rose from the launching pad on time for the first time, a few microseconds before 11 A.M., New York time, bound for a planned week of circling the Earth. It is the spaceship's fourth and final test mission. Thunderclaps from the rockets reverberated through the humid air, the ground trembled and eventually the spaceship disappeared in its own vapor trail. The astronauts, Capt. Thomas K. Mattingly 2d of the Navy and Henry W. Hartsfield Jr., were on their way to a 185-milehigh orbit, the highest thus far attained by the shuttle.

called ''gym rats'' wandered into and around the place, as they always seemed to do. But the sounds of the fast-paced pick-up game in progress on the court echoed off the rows of sky blue metal bleachers that surrounded it. Soon, one by one, Carolina's stars of the past trickled in. Mike O'Koren, who earned all-America honors twice during his three seasons, entered and quietly sat behind one basket. Geoff Crompton, a massive center and a former teammate of O'Koren, soon followed, as did Al Wood, whose dazzling offensive showing in the 1981 National Collegiate tournament semifinal game is still legend here. Later, Phil Ford, the best pure point guard of his era, made an appearance, too. It is a daily routine. They come back to mingle with the area's young people and to rekindle tales of glory with those players who represent Carolina's present and its future.