What was going on when I was born?

A chart published yesterday listing metropolitan areas with the highest percentage of black residents incorrectly identified the sixth-ranked area. It is Petersburg, Va.

Two years after the imposition of a tough national energy policy sent half the nation's oil rigs across the border into the United States, Canada's federal and provincial governments are providing new incentives for the troubled industry and signs of recovery are beginning to emerge. ''We've bottomed out and we're on the mend,'' said Harold Carlyle, chairman of the Canadian Petroleum Association and senior vice president of Gulf Canada Resources. And G.J. Johnson, head of the Royal Bank's Global Energy and Minerals Group, said, ''The oil and gas industry is solidly on the road to recovery.'' Evidence of improvement includes an increase in the number of working rigs in western Canada to 385 at the end of November from 283 a year earlier; a sharp jump in seismic studies, the first phase of oil exploration, and several significant oil discoveries over recent months. Moreover, analysts foresee a 10 percent acceleration in drilling next year.

The Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation clashed today over whether the Dreyfus Corporation, a major mutual fund company, should be allowed to purchase a bank. The Dreyfus application to acquire a New Jersey bank is a test case that might determine whether mutual fund companies in general will be allowed to own banks. The mutual funds, which operate the popular money market funds, are seeking new ways of competing with banks and savings institutions. The competition between the banks and the money market funds has become especially acute now that banks and savings institutions are being allowed to offer money market accounts without interest rate ceilings.

When officials at the Dravo Corporation decided three years ago to move into a new office building in downtown Pittsburgh, they had no idea that a prolonged economic downturn was on the way. The engineering and construction company budgeted some $21 million in 1982 to cover the cost of moving and buying new equipment for what was to be called Dravo Tower, a 54-story edifice. But the $21 million has never been spent. ''We had planned to start moving in this month,'' said William P. Stewart, a Dravo spokesman. ''But those plans have been scrapped.''

The Federal Reserve Board, in a move intended to stimulate the long-awaited economic recovery, today cut its key lending rate to 8 1/2 percent from 9 percent, effective Tuesday. The reduction in the discount rate, which is the interest the Federal Reserve charges on loans it makes to banks and other financial institutions, was the seventh since July, when the discount rate was 12 percent. Other interest rates have also fallen several points since then, in response, and analysts said that the latest cut meant that short-term rates, including the prime rate, could soon drop by half a percentage point. Usual Practice Not Followed Some analysts said that the Federal Reserve's action today shows that it is trying to force down interest rates to deal with the persisting recession, rather than follow its usual practice of cutting the discount rate only after short-term interest rates decline in the financial markets.

The New Jersey Assembly gave final legislative approval tonight to a bill raising the legal drinking age from 19 to 21, effective Jan. 1. Governor Kean has said he would sign the bill, which passed on a vote of 48 to 26, seven more than needed. The higher legal drinking age will not affect those who will be 19 years old by Jan. 1. Sponsors of the new law believe it should not take away a right that those now 19 or 20 years old already enjoy. Both New York and Connecticut raised their drinking age to 19 from 18 earlier this year. In the past, when the drinking age differed in the three states, people too young to get liquor in their own state frequently crossed into the neighboring states to take advantage of the lower drinking age.

Business inventories edged down one-tenth of 1 percent in October despite an unusually sharp 2.2 percent drop in business sales, the Government reported today. The month-to-month sales decline was the biggest since the 1975 recession. The figures raised the inventory-to-sales ratio to 1.55 for October, the highest level for the closely watched indicator since 1975. The ratio represents the number of months needed to sell off stocks on hand.

An advisory committee appointed by Governor Carey will recommend today a statewide freeze on about $5 billion in planned hospital construction, state officials said yesterday. Almost $2 billion in construction had been planned by major hospitals in New York City. The committee, the Health Care Capital Policy Advisory Committee, is expected to ask for the suspension of all construction plans now awaiting approval by the State Department of Health and until a more rational and regional approach toward hospital expansion and reconstruction is devised. Only Proposals Affected The recommendations are said to affect only proposed construction and not any under way or any that has already obtained state approval. According to state officials, the proposed freeze is an effort to prevent increases in the cost of public health care, which must absorb most of the cost of any new construction.

A group of foreign banks has agreed to grant Nicaragua $25 million to $30 million in short-term trade credits as part of an arrangement to meet a $40 million interest payment due Friday on Nicaragua's oustanding debt, Nicaraguan officials said today. The credit, the first significant commercial bank loan to Nicaragua since the 1979 Sandinist revolution, was negotiated last week with Bank of America and several other Western banks, the officials said. ''We've always said we were going to pay,'' one senior official said, ''and we will pay, but this loan makes it easier.'' The official, who asked not to be identified, said that without the loan, Nicaragua would not have been able to make Friday's payment. But he added that even if the loan money is not in hand by then, Nicaragua would still pay on time.

Because of an editing error, George Vecsey's column yesterday in SportsMonday misquoted Coach John Thompson of the Georgetown University basketball team. When asked whether Virginia's players should be ranked first in the news-agency polls, Coach Thompson used a double negative, saying that they ''do not not deserve it.''

Two men in ski masks, one carrying a shotgun, surprised the lone guard at a Bronx armored car company Sunday night and carried off an estimated $5.3 million packed in moneybags, the police said yesterday. The thieves, who broke into the building by cutting a hole in the roof, fled with 10 to 12 canvas bags containing $50 and $100 bills that were neatly piled in the ''money room'' at the Sentry Armored Car Courier Company in the Williamsbridge section. But company officials told the police the holdup men left behind $20 million in $50 and $100 bills that also were stacked on handcarts in the building at 3548 Boston Road. Before leaving the two men scrawled on a dusty mirror: ''Robbers was here.'' ''We are investigating the possibility it was an inside job,'' said Alice McGillion, the deputy police commissioner for public information.

The Polish authorities announced measures today that they said would ''suspend'' martial law. The action left the state with sweeping powers and shifted other curbs to the regular penal code. Three bills submitted to Parliament would end such aspects of the yearlong military regime as internment, domestic travel restrictions and monitoring of mail and telephone calls. Several key provisions emphasized the Government's power to ''undertake necessary decisions'' and to restore martial law restrictions at any point.