What was going on when I was born?

The Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company, New York's fourth-largest bank, cut its consumer loan rates yesterday by one to one and a half percentage points. The move by Manufacturers Hanover, a leading consumer lender, follows some other recent interest-cutting moves by local banks. The Chase Manhattan Bank reduced its interest rate last Friday by a percentage point, although its auto loan rate remains at a base of 15 percent, compared with Manufacturers Hanover's 14 1/2 percent. In mid-March, the Bank of New York cut its car loan rate to 13 3/4 percent.

Companies Biscayne Federal Savings and Loan of Miami was declared insolvent and closed despite the objections of its chairman and principal stockholder. It was one of the largest thrift industry failures ever. Biscayne had $2 billion in assets at the end of 1982 and a negative net worth of $22.5 million. Federal regulators immediately chartered a successor association to protect depositors. (D1.) Thomson McKinnon announced plans to buy First Federal Savings and Loan in Madison, Conn. The acquisition, which must be approved by Federal regulators, would apparently be the first purchase of a savings and loan association by a brokerage firm. (Page D1.) Treasury Secretary Donald T. Regan called for a moratorium to halt the rapid restructuring of the financial industry. (D6.)

At a meeting with his senior foreign policy advisers last April, President Reagan approved a policy with the goal of preventing a ''proliferation of Cuba-model states'' in Central America that could threaten the United States militarily and economically. Acccording to a highly classified document summarizing the meeting, the group proposed both covert and political programs to keep the Sandinist Government in Nicaragua from ''exporting revolution'' to El Salvador and to strengthen pro-United States elements in El Salvador and Guatemala. In addition to covert activities designed to put pressure on Nicaragua, the group expressed approval of a military coup that overthrew an elected Government in Guatemala, a beginning of covert activities in that country against anti-Government forces and efforts to keep Mexico ''isolated'' on Central American issues. The covert activities in the region, according to the memorandum, would be carried out pursuant to National Security Decision Directive 17, which was the President's approval in November 1981 of a plan for covert activities in Central America, particularly against Nicaragua.

The Food and Drug Administration said today that it had approved a new nonprescription sponge contraceptive for women. The soft, disposable polyurethane sponge is permeated with spermicide and does not have to be fitted by a physician.Faye H. Peterson, a spokesman for the food and drug agency, said that in clinical trials the sponge ''was found to be about 85 percent effective in preventing pregnancy.'' The sponge, she said, has an effectiveness rate ''in the same range as other vaginal contraceptive products such as the diaphragm.''

The nation's major airlines, most of which are still losing money, experienced a big upturn in travel in March, but they are still reluctant to say a recovery is under way. The solid upturn in passenger traffic, the airlines and analysts agree, is largely a result of deep discount fares and other unusual factors at work last month. Some analysts, however, see the start of an upturn in business travel tied to an economic recovery. Six Report Big Gains Six of the seven major airlines that have reported traffic figures this week said they had gains averaging 21.1 percent in March compared with the month a year ago. The six airlines are United, American, Eastern, Delta, Trans World and USAir. This was the second consecutive month that traffic increased, with the industry showing a rise of 9.2 percent in February.

Space flight controllers, exuding confidence as they struggled to save the world's largest communication satellite, decided today on a sequence of jet-firing maneuvers to boost the errant craft to its desired operational orbit in 10 days to two weeks. The plan they described involves raising the low point, or perigee, of the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite's orbit in gradual steps until the orbit is circular at 21,950 miles, the current apogee, or high point, of the orbit. When the satellite was deployed by the space shuttle Challenger Monday, an apparent failure of an attached propulsion unit left the 5,000-pound craft in a lower, elliptical orbit ranging from 13,540 miles to 21,950 miles from the Earth. After the higher circular orbit is achieved, two additional firings by some of the satellite's 24 thruster jets are planned then to lift the satellite even higher to the desired altitude of 22,300 miles.

The Federal Environmental Protection Agency has acknowledged that it failed for two years to pursue information that could have forced several corporations to finance a multimillion-dollar cleanup of a vast toxic lagoon in southern New Jersey. The site, an estimated 50 million gallons of oily wastes bordering a defunct tank farm in Gloucester County, has contaminated several nearby water wells. It has become one of the most serious cleanup problems facing the agency in the New York region; the E.P.A. ranks it among the top 50 on its list of the 418 most dangerous hazardous waste sites in the United States. Under a 1980 Federal law, companies shown to have dumped dangerous wastes at sites that imperil the public can be made to pay for the cleanup whether or not they knew they were causing pollution. In 1981 the E.P.A. was given a list of companies that had used the tanks at the New Jersey site. But the list was never followed up.

International White House policy in Nicaragua has been challenged by senior State Department officials, according to Reagan Administration aides. They said the officials raised questions last week about the legality of United States involvement in covert military operations against the Sandinist Government. (Page A1, Column 1.) Covert actions against Nicaragua to keep it from ''exporting revolution'' to El Salvador were approved by President Reagan and his policy advisers a year ago, according to a highly classified document summarizing a meeting they held. (A1:1.)

The Canadian Government, faced with a possible loss of markets, appears to have decided to cut the price of its natural gas exports to the United States by an amount roughly comparable to the price cut for oil announced last month by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. Canada, according to trade sources, would reduce the current price of $4.94 per million British thermal units by some 50 cents for volumes now being taken and would also offer temporary discounts to about $3.30 for additional amounts of gas. Energy Minister Jean Chretien, meeting with reporters after talks this afternoon with Energy Secretary Donald P. Hodel, expressed Canada's ''flexibility'' on gas export prices but did not directly address the specifics of the reported plan. But Marc R. Lortie, first secretary at the Canadian Embassy, seemed to confirm that this plan, in fact, was what Mr. Chretien had in mind.

President Reagan, traveling to one of the nation's most economically depressed regions, drew an angry crowd of 4,000 protesters here today as he pledged to help retrain unemployed steelworkers for new jobs and protect the steel industry from collapsing. One of the largest anti-Reagan demonstrations of the last two years gathered outside the Pittsburgh Hilton Hotel, noisily denouncing the President and his policies as Mr. Reagan spoke inside to the National Conference on the Disabled Worker. The conference was aimed at finding ways to retrain unemployed steelworkers and others for new jobs in high-technology industries. Applause From the Audience ''I come not only as a speaker, but as a possible victim,'' Mr. Reagan said, in a joking reference to the protesters. ''I assume there are a number of Democrats who would just love to dislocate me.''

The workers at the Harmstorf shipyard here kneel in the piercing glow of acetylene torches, creating a ship's bulkhead by welding steel ribs to curved steel plate. In West Germany's shipbuilding industry, the Harmstorf workers are the lucky ones because many of them still have jobs. Seventy miles to the south, in the port of Hamburg, 3,500 workers at the much bigger Howaldtswerke will soon be laid off, the victims of a worldwide collapse of the shipbuilding industry. Like many other small shipyards across northern Europe, Harmstorf has weathered the industry's storm relatively well until now. Their moderate size and flexibility kept fixed costs down, and the yards kept humming by providing specialized vessels such as chemical tankers, sophisticated oceanographic research ships or the roll-on, roll-off container carriers favored by developing countries with a dearth of good harbors.

The chief of Soviet intelligence operations in France and his principal aides were among the 47 Soviet officials expelled on Tuesday, an informed source said today. All were accused of espionage. The source, who could not be named under the ground rules of a conversation with a group of reporters, identified the chief Soviet agent as Nikolai Chetverikov, who was the third-ranking diplomat at the Soviet Embassy.