What was going on when I was born?

Americans ate more sweets last year than they had in any year of the past decade, but domestic candy makers still have a slightly sour taste in their mouths these days. From West German lollipops and Dutch candy canes to Brazilian mints and Canadian chocolate chips, cheaper, imported candies and baking confections have carved out a small but rapidly growing market in America. The imports, which have nearly tripled in volume in the last five years, have yet to dent the growing sales of industry giants such as the Hershey Chocolate Company and M&M/ Mars, which sell brand-name candy bars and confections. But smaller manufacturers in the $10 billion industry who sell bulk candy that competes directly with cheaper imports say they have already been hurt. Some have laid off workers, moved operations overseas and abandoned unprofitable products. Others may soon join them.

WHEN the Knicks acquired Patrick Ewing last May through the first-ever lottery in the National Basketball Association, the team's executive vice president-director of basketball operations, Dave DeBusschere, reacted like a quiz-show contestant who had hit the jackpot. He shook his fist, grinned and carried on as if Monty Hall had told him there was good news behind door No. 2. For DeBusschere, ordinarily a reserved individual, such a display of emotion could be excused. For by landing Ewing, he had moved his franchise a giant step closer to being a very legitimate contender. And, after a 1984-85 season in which the Knicks' medical reports had required him to have the forbearance of Job -serious injuries or illness struck down Bill Cartwright, Marvin Webster, Truck Robinson and Bernard King -a 7-foot lottery prize was a welcome reversal. With Ewing aboard, Knick season-ticket sales abruptly rose - by this week about 10,500 of them had been sold, almost 5,000 more than last year - and there was a feeling that good times were ahead. But that soaring optimism has dampened a bit. And as a new season nears, there are sobering second thoughts.

Companies Beatrice's board unanimously rejected a $4.9 billion bid from Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Company. A statement by the board after a five-and-a-half-hour meeting was also seen as rejecting any efforts by Beatrice officials to put together their own bid for the giant food and consumer products company. [Page D1.]

A dispatch from Kansas City, Mo., Friday on Missourians' excitement over the ''I-70'' World Series misstated the period between the departure of the Browns from St. Louis and the arrival of the Athletics in Kansas City. It was one year. The dispatch also misstated the year the Royals succeeded the Athletics; it was 1969.

A New York State program to require welfare recipients to take jobs or job training is to begin next month on a modest scale that will affect only new applicants for aid in New York City, state officials said yesterday. As envisioned, the $30 million-a-year program would eventually move hundreds of thousands of aid recipients from welfare rolls into private jobs, raising their living standards, enhancing the economy and cutting the state's $2.5 billion annual welfare bill. But to start with, officials said, only new applicants for the Aid to Families With Dependent Children program in New York City - amounting to about 2,000 people a month - will be screened for possible placement in jobs or assignment to on-the-job training or educational programs leading to employment. Some Mothers Exempt Mothers with children under age 6 will not be required to participate. A recipient of benefits who refuses to participate will lose that aid, but the benefits for children will be continued.

In a nightmarish repeat of the fourth game of the American League pennant playoff, Charlie Leibrandt lost first a shutout and then the game in the ninth inning tonight in the second game of the World Series. Stymied on two hits by Leibrandt through eight innings, the St. Louis Cardinals struck for four runs with two out, defeated the Kansas City Royals, 4-2, and grabbed a two- games-to-none lead in the Series. Jack Clark, swinging at a 3-0 pitch, singled home the Cardinals' first run, and Terry Pendleton, whose dazzling defensive play helped save the first-game victory, produced the crunching blow, a three-run double after Leibrandt loaded the bases by purposely walking Cesar Cedeno. The stunning flurry of runs sent the Series on to St. Louis for the third game Tuesday night. Bret Saberhagen, the Royals' 20-game winner, will pitch against Joaquin Andujar, the Cardinals' 21-game winner.

International Egypt said Tunisia had helped the United States intercept the Egyptian plane carrying the four hijackers of the Achille Lauro. President Hosni Mubarak said he was certian that there had been such collusion. A White House spokesman strongly denied it. [Page A1, Column 6.] Leon Klinghoffer's body was ceremoniously returned to New York, his native city. An Army guard of honor saluted when his coffin arrived at Kennedy International Airport. A message of sympathy from President Reagan was read and he was eulogized by New York legislators. Mr. Klinghoffer's body arrived from Rome where it had been taken after washing up on Syria's coast. It had been thrown overboard after he had been killed by the hijackers of the Achille Lauro. [A1:4.]

A selection on Friday from the writings of Claude Simon, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, omitted the names of the translator and the publisher of the excerpted works - ''The Flanders Road,'' ''The Palace,'' ''Histoire'' and ''The Battle of Pharsalus.'' The translator is Richard Howard; the books were published by George Braziller.

With an injured Freeman McNeil wanting to play but merely a sideline cheerleader who was shaking teammates' hands as they came off the field, the Jets' five-game winning streak ended today where other bad memories remain for them. The New England Patriots, a team starting a quarterback who had seemed as if his better playing days were behind him, scored a 20-13 upset. Last season here, the Patriots pushed the Jets, who came into that game with a 6-2 record, on a downward spiral. Steve Grogan, the 32-year-old quarterback whose surgically-repaired knee made him a reserve, scored the winning touchdown with fewer than 4 minutes remaining to break a 13-all tie. Playing because Tony Eason had a sprained shoulder, Grogan dashed 3 yards to his left on a bootleg after faking a handoff to the right that drew all the Jets to that side of the field. It was the first rushing touchdown by the Patriots since the season's opener.

An article in Business Day on Friday misstated the amount of the BankAmerica Corporation's nonperforming loans as of June 30. It was $3.58 billion.

Japan's steps to spur economic growth, announced with some fanfare early last week, are unlikely to produce as much growth as the Government hopes for, according to economists and industry specialists here. The incentives were Japan's latest response to increasing world pressure to reduce its large trade and capital surpluses. Since September, Japan and the other leading industrial nations, the United States, Britain, France and West Germany, known as the Group of Five, have been intervening in world currency markets to bring down the strength of the dollar, considered one of the causes of Japan's surplus. But many economists believe that intervention is only a short-term solution, and so Japan also agreed to spur economic growth. In this way, Japanese consumers would have more to spend on imports, businesses would invest more at home and Japan could derive more growth from its domestic market rather than exports. $19 Billion in Growth Japan's package offered incentives to build more houses, expand consumer credit, increase local government spending on public works and improve electricity and gas services. The Government estimated that the measures would generate about $19 billion in economic growth over the next year, expanding the gross national product by 1.27 percent.

Traffic in New York City is horrendous, according to city officials, transportation analysts, traffic engineers, taxi drivers and other fuming motorists. And the predictions are that it will get worse. ''I think things are going to get intolerable,'' Samuel I. Schwartz, head of the Bureau of Traffic Operations, said. The coup de grace may, in fact, fall this week, which officials say may turn out to be one of the worst traffic weeks in the city's history. More than 80 world leaders are expected here for the 40th anniversary celebrations of the United Nations. This means endless motorcades - it is not unheard of for a country to inquire about the length of a rival country's motorcade, then add cars to its own accordingly - as well as entourages of aides, body guards, security police and Secret Service agents.