What was going on when I was born?

The House of Representatives today approved, by a vote of 350 to 33, a bill that largely exempts shipowners from antitrust laws. The bill, which has a companion measure now stalled in the Senate, marks a sharp departure from recent trends in Government antitrust policy. But it was supported by the Reagan Administration as well as by major segments of the maritime industry, including shipowners, shippers, port authorities and unions representing seafaring employees. Consumer groups opposed the bill, contending that it would raise prices of goods carried by ship.

Israeli troops and tanks pushed into west Beirut in force today in a drive prompted by the assassination on Tuesday of Lebanon's President-elect, Bashir Gemayel. Sweeping northward from positions they held in the southern suburbs and westward from positions in east Beirut, the Israelis ran into some resistance from Lebanese Moslem and leftist militiamen. The advance was supported by Israeli gunboats, which pounded targets in west Beirut. As the drive was continuing, the funeral of Mr. Gemayel, who was to have been inaugurated President on Sept. 23, was held in his home village of Bikfeiya, nine miles east-northeast of Beirut, with the nation's principal political leaders leading thousands of mourners.

Industrial production dropped five-tenths of 1 percent in August, the Government reported today, reflecting the continuing decline in the economy and signaling a delay in the longpromised recovery until late fall or early winter. ''The recovery may be in sight, but we don't have evidence that the turning point has been reached,'' said Theodore Torda, the senior economist in the Commerce Department. ''The recovery has been postponed to the fourth quarter.'' The Reagan Administration, hoping for a rebound by the crucial offyear Congressional elections, had promised a strong recovery in the second quarter and, when that did not materialize, a recovery in the third quarter. Just last week in Kansas, President Reagan said, ''Yes, the recovery has been sighted.'' And Treasury Secretary Donald T. Regan has predicted that there would be relatively strong growth this quarter. But today Mr. Torda said ''you can flip a coin'' over whether the third quarter will show a small minus or a small plus. The White House had no official comment.

International Israeli troops took positions in west Beirut in a drive prompted by the assassination on Tuesday of Lebanon's President-elect, Bashir Gemayel. The Israelis ran into some resistance from Lebanese Moslem and leftist militiamen. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Shafik al-Wazzan called for the withdrawal of the Israeli troops. (Page A1, Col.6.) Prime Minister Menachem Begin reportedly told the American speical envoy, Morris Draper, that he ordered Israeli troops into west Beruit to prevent the reorganization of the Palestine Liberation Organization and leftist Moslem militias. The move was designed to salvage Israel's political gains in Lebanon following the assassination of President-elect Bashir Gemayel. (A1:4.)

A Manhattan grand jury is trying to subpoena a 10-year-old Roosevelt Island boy in a burglary investigation, and his parents are fighting the move, contending that the experience would be too emotionally disturbing. A hearing began in State Supreme Court yesterday before Acting Justice Herbert I. Altman to determine whether testifying would be too traumatic for the fifth grader. His name was not used in the proceedings.

Columbia University's Graduate School of Business is, by many accounts, an institution with an inferiority complex. Indeed, at this summer's student revue the biggest laugh line went something like this: ''What are Harvard, Stanford, and Columbia?'' ''Two prestigious business schools and a small country in South America.'' ''I'd say we're definitely one of the top five business schools in the country,'' said Boris Yavitz, who stepped down after seven years as dean this summer. However, in the next breath he concedes, ''But I know there are twelve schools in the top five.'' Asked to name the top five business schools in the country, though, the deans of other national business schools do not come up with Columbia: ''I'm sorry, but they're not up there yet,'' said Donald Carroll, dean of the Wharton School. ''They're on an attractive trajectory, though. Columbia had a bad period in the early 70's, and it has been getting better steadily since then. But reputation lags behind the fact.''

The Senate today voted to kill a proposal to restrict severely a woman's right to obtain an abortion. The vote was 47 to 46, with Senator Jim Sasser, Democrat of Tennessee, providing the deciding vote after the issue seemed stalemated. The vote, which came a few days after President Reagan threw his support behind the legislation, means that the attempt to reverse the Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion in 1973 is almost certainly doomed for this session of Congress. However, it is likely that Congress will continue to restrict the use of Federal funds to pay for abortions through Medicaid and other Government programs.

A small place that usually works hard at offering its guests genteel recklessness and expensive fun, Monaco looked sad and confused today about the death of Princess Grace. Hundreds of people filed by her bier in the Palatine Chapel of the Prince's Palace this afternoon, and many asked afterward, distractedly, unhappily, about what actually happened after the automobile accident Monday that led to the death Tuesday night of the Princess, the former Grace Kelly, and the hospitalization of her daughter Stephanie. The Princess's funeral will take place Saturday. Reports Appear Confused There has been something akin to incoherence in the reports offered by the principality's press office about the accident itself and, subsequently, the condition of the 52-year-old former film actress and her 17-year-old daughter.

Breaking a long silence, the United Technologies Corporation told the Bendix Corporation yesterday that it was prepared to increase its current $75-a-share offer for a controlling interest in Bendix to $85 if the two could reach an agreement to merge on friendly terms. Harry J. Gray, chairman of United Technologies, proposed the increase in a letter to William M. Agee, chairman of Bendix, as a way to resolve what he called the ''intolerable situation'' created by efforts of Bendix and the Martin Marietta Corporation to take over each other. With Bendix free to buy control of Marietta after midnight tonight, the proposal was viewed as an 11th-hour effort to head off a situation in which Bendix buys Marietta and then Marietta gets control of Bendix, thus touching off what many on both sides acknowledge would be ''a real mess.'' Marietta is free to buy control of Bendix after midnight on Sept. 22.

''Jerusalem is the city of God. Jerusalem can also become the city of man in which the believers of the three great monotheistic religions, Christianity, Judaism and Islam, live in full liberty and equality with the followers of other religious communities.''

When the Mexican Government nationalized the country's private banks two weeks ago, it also inherited a huge industrial empire consisting of shares owned by the banks in hundreds of leading Mexican companies. The Government soon announced that, rather than hold onto the shares, it would sell them, perhaps putting the proceeds toward compensation owed to the former owners of the expropriated banks. But the Government has found that doing this will not be easy. For one thing, Mexico's depressed stock market seems incapable of absorbing a flood of shares. For another, the country's private sector is pressing for the return of the shares to their original owners while leftist groups argue that the state should control them.

VINCENT J. LANDRY JR. converses with friends he has never seen, whose names he may never know. They speak to him silently, sometimes late into the night, in words that glow a ghostly green across the screen of his home computer. ''Over the computer a relationship is not tainted, '' said Captain Landry, a 33-year-old United States Air Force pilot who spends at least an hour each night with his Apple II Plus computer, after flying KC-135 aerial refueling aircraft from Castle Air Force Base in Atwater, Calif. ''When we meet someone we have prejudices about the way they look, the sound of their voice, their age,'' he said. ''With computers we have no prejudices.''