What was going on when I was born?

A picture caption in Metropolitan Report on Thursday with an article about the 63d Street subway between Manhattan and Queens misidentified a nearly completed station. It was the Roosevelt Island station.

Short-term interest rates fell sharply yesterday amid rampant speculation by traders and economists that the Federal Reserve had moved to ease monetary policy and encourage lower interest rates. The drop in short-term rates, which amounted to more than a quarter of a percentage point for outstanding securities, spilled over into the note and bond markets, where yields fell modestly for Treasury, corporate and tax- exempt issues. But the largest declines were in the short-term market, where rates on new Treasury bills fell more than half a percentage point from last week's auctions, with the three-month issue averaging 8.82 percent, down from 9.38 percent, and six-month bills at 9.07 percent, down from 9.59 percent. Dow Advances 12.59 The surging credit market helped buoy the stock market yesterday, after its seesaw performance of last week. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 12.59 points, to 1,229.24. Volume slackened to 84.7 million shares.

The Equitable Life Assurance Society of the United States announced yesterday that it would purchase Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette Inc., a leading Wall Street securities firm. The acquisition continues the blending of the stock brokerage, banking and insurance industries as these businesses seek their niches in a deregulated marketplace. In recent years, the Prudential Life Insurance Company of America has bought the Bache Group Inc., a major stock brokerage firm; the American Express Company has diversified into securities, and many banks have begun Gulf and Western said it would make a tender offer of $70 a share for Prentice-Hall stock. Page D1.

A list in Metropolitan Report yesterday of candidates for election today omitted several names.

The small band of armed men walking on a provincial road north of Manila recently was a rag-tag bunch, a Western diplomat recalled. As he approached in his car, the diplomat noted that the men were dressed in T-shirts, jeans and sandals. Some were bearded, a few were smoking. This, the Western military specialist figured worriedly, was to be an encounter with the Communist insurgents, the New People's Army. No, his driver assured him, the scruffy men ahead were not Communist guerrillas, they were members of the Philippine Army manning a checkpoint.

The United Technologies Corporation said today that it had been approached repeatedly over the last year by Edward L. Hennessy, its former president and now chairman of the Allied Corporation, suggesting a merger of the two companies. United said it did explore the possibility of such a merger but decided against making an offer. This unusual disclosure by United Technologies followed unusual news from the company last week. It said Friday that a group of directors was investigating charges that its chairman, Harry J. Gray, had bugged conversations of Mr. Hennessy and other former United officials.

THE more Ted Spieth thought about his career choice, the more convinced he became that he would like to teach in a public school. So, now a college senior, he finished his student teaching last week and will be certified to teach when he graduates in June. But Mr. Spieth will have neither a major nor a minor in education and has not attended a teachers' college. He has majored in psychology and will get his degree from Princeton University, an institution known for producing future lawyers, physicians, economists, physicists, engineers, architects and diplomats - not public school teachers. At a time of great national concern about the low academic abilities of young people who want to become teachers, some of the country's leading liberal arts colleges are turning out a small but steady stream of candidates for jobs in the public schools.

As traffic officials struggle with a growing wave of highway reconstruction, Manhattan is a joyless isle for those who must drive into its business districts every day. New York City officials, who four months ago were sharply criticized for fixing so many routes all at once, have taken a variety of steps to remedy the problem, and they say they are beginning to chip away at the congestion. But the two roadways on the west - the Henry Hudson Parkway and Riverside Drive - have been so choked by the rehabilitation of rusting viaducts and crumbling surfaces that cars regularly back up for several miles. Access from the east is clogged by repairs on all four East River bridges. Altogether, 13 of the bridges' 31 lanes are closed.

International Offices, banks and stores reopened in New Delhi for the first time since the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi last Wednesday. Commuters, shoppers and tourists crowded the streets and traffic moved normally. (Page A1, Col. 2.) Ten South African blacks died as hundreds of thousands of workers and students boycotted jobs and schools in an anti-Government protest. Police officers used rubber bullets, buckshot and tear gas against the demonstrators in black townships around Johannesburg and Pretoria. (A1:1.)

Offices, banks and most stores reopened in the capital today for the first time since the assassination last Wednesday of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Commuters, shoppers and tourists crowded the streets, and motor scooters, cars, buses and taxis moved about normally. Schools, however, will remain closed until Saturday.

Because of an editing error, the Washington Watch column in Business Day yesterday misstated the outcome of the 1968 election. The Republican Party regained the White House.

Dow Jones & Company and a group of four investors have offered $112 million for the stock of the Des Moines Register and Tribune Company, a large communications organization, according to Michael G. Gartner, the Register and Tribune's president and one of the prospective investors. Mr. Gartner said that the proposal called for Dow Jones, publisher of The Wall Street Journal, to own 50 percent of the stock, with the other investors dividing the rest. The other individual investors are Gary G. Gerlach, the publisher of the Register and Tribune, the company's flagship newspaper; David Belin, a Des Moines lawyer, and Richard Levitt, vice chairman of the Northwest Bancorporation, a holding company in Minneapolis. The proposal came as a surprise to the Register and Tribune's board of directors, according to David Kruidenier, the chairman, who said that the board has taken the offer under advisement with no decision expected for several weeks. First Boston has been retained by the board to help evaluate the proposal, according to Mr. Gartner.