February 20
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February 20 is the 51st day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 314 days remaining until the end of the year (315 in leap years).
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Births[change]
- 1469 – Thomas Cajetan, Italian cardinal (d. 1534)
- 1631 – Thomas Osborne, 1st Duke of Leeds, English statesman (d. 1712)
- 1633 - Jan de Caen, Dutch portrait painter (d. 1702)
- 1726 - William Prescott, American Revolutionary colonel (d. 1795)
- 1759 – Johann Christian Reil, German physician (d. 1813)
- 1794 – William Carleton, Irish novelist (d. 1869)
- 1802 – Charles Auguste de Bleriot, Belgian violinist and composer (d. 1870)
- 1811 - Henry Hastings Sibley, American politician (d. 1891)
- 1819 – Alfred Escher, Swiss politician and railroad entrepreneur (d. 1882)
- 1839 – Benjamin Waugh, British social reformer (d. 1908)
- 1844 – Ludwig Boltzmann, Austrian physicist (d. 1906)
- 1844 – Joshua Slocum, Canadian seaman and adventurer (d. 1909)
- 1848 - Edward Henry Harriman, American railroad executive (d. 1909)
- 1860 - Karl Mantzius, Danish theatre and movie actor, director and writer (d. 1921)
- 1866 - Carl Westman, Swedish architect and designer (d. 1936)
- 1867 – Louise, Princess Royal and Duchess of Fife (d. 1931)
- 1874 - Mary Garden, Scottish operatic soprano (d. 1967)
- 1879 - Hod Stuart, Canadian ice hockey player (d. 1907)
- 1886 – Bela Kun, Hungarian politician (d. 1939)
- 1887 – Vincent Massey, Governor-General of Canada (d. 1967)
- 1898 – Jimmy Yancey, American musician (d. 1951)
- 1899 – Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney, American businessman (d. 1992)
- 1901 – Muhammad Naguib, 1st President of Egypt (d. 1984)
- 1901 – Rene Dubos, French microbiologist (d. 1982)
- 1902 – Ansel Adams, American photographer (d. 1984)
- 1904 – Alexei Kosygin, Soviet Premier (d. 1980)
- 1906 - Gale Gordon, American television and radio actor (d. 1995)
- 1909 – Heinz Erhardt, German comedian, entertainer and actor (d. 1979)
- 1912 - Muriel Humphrey, United States Senator and Second Lady of the United States (d. 1998)
- 1914 - John Daly, South African-born broadcaster (d. 1991)
- 1918 – Leonore Annenberg, American billionaire (d. 2009)
- 1920 - Kathleen Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington, sister of John F. Kennedy (d. 1948)
- 1923 – Forbes Burnham, 1st Prime Minister and 3rd President of Guyana (d. 1985)
- 1924 - Gloria Vanderbilt, American socialite and clothing designer
- 1925 - Tochinishiki Kiyotaka, Japanese sumo wrestler (d. 1990)
- 1925 – Robert Altman, American movie director (d. 2006)
- 1926 - Richard Matheson, American science fiction writer and screenwriter
- 1926 - Bob Richards, American pole vaulter
- 1927 – Sidney Poitier, American actor
- 1927 – Ibrahim Ferrer, Cuban musician (d. 2005)
- 1928 - Jean Kennedy Smith, American diplomat and sister of John F. Kennedy
- 1929 - Toshiro Mayuzumi, Japanese composer (d. 1997)
- 1930 – Willie Cunningham, Northern Irish footballer (d. 2007)
- 1931 - John Milnor, American mathematician
- 1936 - Shigeo Nagashima, Japanese baseball player and coach
- 1936 – Larry Hovis, American actor (d. 2003)
- 1937 – Robert Huber, German chemist
- 1940 – Jimmy Greaves, English footballer
- 1941 – Buffy Sainte-Marie, Canadian musician
- 1942 – Phil Esposito, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1942 – Mitch McConnell, American politician
- 1942 - Claude Miller, French movie director and screenwriter (d. 2012)
- 1944 – Willem van Hanegem, Dutch footballer
- 1944 – Lew Soloff, American jazz trumpeter
- 1945 – Annu Kapoor, Indian actor
- 1945 - George F. Smoot, American astrophysicist
- 1946 – Brenda Blethyn, British actress
- 1946 - Richard Cocciante, French-Italian singer and songwriter
- 1946 - Sandy Duncan, American singer and actress
- 1947 – Eggert Magnusson, Icelandic businessman
- 1947 – Peter Osgood, English footballer (d. 2006)
- 1948 – Christopher A. Pissarides, Cypriot-British economist
- 1948 - Pierre Bouchard, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1949 – Ivana Trump, Czech-American socialite
- 1950 – Walter Becker, American guitarist
- 1951 – Gordon Brown, former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
- 1952 - Abdala Bucaram, former President of Ecuador
- 1953 – Poison Ivy, American musician
- 1954 – Anthony Head, British actor
- 1954 – Patty Hearst, American heiress
- 1954 - Jon Brant, American musician
- 1960 – Kee Marcello, Swedish guitarist
- 1960 - Joel Hodgson, American comedian
- 1961 – Imogen Stubbs, British actress
- 1961 – Ion Geolgau, Romanian footballer
- 1962 - Pierre Quinon, French pole vaulter (d. 2011)
- 1963 – Ian Brown, British singer (The Stone Roses)
- 1966 – Cindy Crawford, American model
- 1966 - Dannis Mitchell, American athlete
- 1967 – Kurt Cobain, American rock musician (Nirvana) (d. 1994)
- 1969 - Kaiji Takayama, Japanese professional wrestler
- 1969 - Sinisa Mihajlovic, Serbian footballer
- 1969 - Danis Tanovic, Bosnian movie director and screenwriter
- 1971 – Jari Litmanen, Finnish footballer
- 1971 - Shawn McKenzie, American programmer
- 1972 - Brent Gretzky, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1973 – Kimberley Davis, Australian actress
- 1975 - Nicolas Wallin, Swedish ice hockey player
- 1975 – Brian Littrell, American singer (Backstreet Boys)
- 1976 – Ed Graham, British drummer (The Darkness)
- 1978 – Lauren Ambrose, American actress
- 1978 - Jay Hernandez, American actor
- 1980 – Imanol Harinordoquy, French rugby player
- 1980 – Arthur Abraham, Armenian-German boxer
- 1980 – Artur Boruc, Polish footballer
- 1980 - Luis Gabriel Rey, Colombian footballer
- 1981 – Tony Hibbert, English footballer
- 1982 - Jason Hirsh, American baseball player
- 1983 - Justin Verlander, American baseball player
- 1984 - Ramzee Robinson, American basketball player
- 1985 – Yulia Volkova, Russian singer
- 1986 - Diego Reis, Brazilian footballer
- 1988 - Jiah Khan, Indian actress
- 1988 – Rihanna, Barbadian singer
Deaths[change]
- 702 - K'inich Kan B'Alam II, King of the Mayan city of Palenque (b. 635)
- 1171 - Conan IV, Duke of Brittany (b. 1138)
- 1194 – King Tancred of Sicily (b. 1138)
- 1408 – Henry Percy, 1st Earl of Northumberland, English politician (b. 1342)
- 1431 – Pope Martin V (b. 1368)
- 1513 – John, King of Denmark (b. 1455)
- 1618 – Philip William, Prince of Orange (b. 1554)
- 1762 – Tobias Mayer, German astronomer (b. 1723)
- 1771 – Jean Jacques d'Ortous de Marain, French geophysicist (b. 1678)
- 1773 – King Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia (b. 1701)
- 1778 - Laura Bassi, Italian scholar (b. 1711)
- 1790 – Joseph III, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1741)
- 1803 – Marie Dumesnil, French actress (b. 1713)
- 1806 - Lachlan McIntosh, Scottish-American military and political leader (b. 1725)
- 1810 – Andreas Hofer, Tyrolian patriot (b. 1767)
- 1871 – Paul Kane, Canadian painter (b. 1810)
- 1895 – Frederick Douglass, American abolitionist (b. 1817)
- 1907 – Henri Moissan, French chemist (b. 1852)
- 1910 - Boutros Ghali, Egyptian politician (b. 1846)
- 1916 – Klas Pontus Arnoldson, Swedish writer and pacifist (b. 1844)
- 1919 – Habibullah Khan, Emir of Afghanistan (b. 1872)
- 1920 – Robert Peary, American Arctic explorer (b. 1856)
- 1920 – Jacinta Marto, Portuguese religious figure (b. 1910)
- 1948 - Robert P. Lamont, 5th United States Secretary of Commerce (b. 1867)
- 1961 – Percy Grainger, Australian composer (b. 1882)
- 1963 - Ferenc Fricsay, Hungarian conductor (b. 1914)
- 1963 - Jacob Gade, Danish composer (b. 1879)
- 1965 – Fred Immler, German actor (b. 1880)
- 1966 – Chester Nimitz, American admiral (b. 1885)
- 1968 - Anthony Asquith, British movie director and writer (b. 1902)
- 1969 - Ernest Ansermet, Swiss conductor (b. 1883)
- 1970 - Sophie Treadwell, American playwright and journalist (b. 1885)
- 1972 – Maria Goeppert-Mayer, German physicist (b. 1906)
- 1972 - Walter Winchell, American journalist (b. 1897)
- 1976 – Rene Cassin, French judge (b. 1887)
- 1982 – Rene Dubos, French microbiologist (b. 1901)
- 1992 - Dick York, American actor (b. 1928)
- 1993 – Ferruccio Lamborghini, Italian automobile manufacturer (b. 1916)
- 1996 – Solomon Asch, American psychologist (b. 1907)
- 1999 – Sarah Kane, English playwright (b. 1971)
- 2000 - Anatoly Sobchak, Russian politician (b. 1937)
- 2003 - Orville Freeman, 29th Governor of Minnesota (b. 1918)
- 2005 – Hunter S. Thompson, American writer (b. 1937)
- 2007 – Carl-Henning Pedersen, Danish painter (b. 1913)
- 2007 – F Albert Cotton, American chemist (b. 1930)
- 2010 – Alexander Haig, American politician (b. 1924)
- 2012 – Vitaly Vorotnikov, Soviet-Russian politician (b. 1926)
- 2012 - Katie Hall, American politician (b. 1938)
- 2012 - Sullivan Walker, American actor (b. 1939)
Events[change]
- 1472 – Orkney and Shetland are annexed to the crown of Scotland.
- 1547 – Edward VI of England is crowned King of England at Westminster Abbey.
- 1724 – The premiere of Giulio Cesare, an Italian opera by George Frideric Handel, takes place in London.
- 1725 – The first reported case of white men scalping Native Americans takes place in New Hampshire colony.
- 1792 – The Postal Service Act, establishing the United States Post Office Department, is signed by President George Washington.
- 1799 - The Blackbrook Reservoir in Leicestershire, England, breaks.
- 1810 – Andreas Hofer, Tyrolean patriot and leader of rebellion against Napoleon's forces, was executed.
- 1816 – Gioachino Rossini's The Barber of Seville debuts at Teatro Argentina, with a fiasco.
- 1835 – Concepción, Chile is destroyed by an earthquake
- 1864 – Battle of Olustee
- 1872 – In New York City the Metropolitan Museum of Art opens.
- 1873 – The University of California opens its first medical school in San Francisco, California.
- 1877 - Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake is first performed at the Bolshoi Theatre, Moscow.
- 1878 - Pope Leo XIII is elected.
- 1901 – The legislature of Hawaii Territory convenes for the first time.
- 1909 - The Futurist Manifesto is published by the French journalist Le Figaro.
- 1913 – King O'Malley drives in the first survey peg to mark commencement of work on the construction of Canberra.
- 1919 - Emir of Afghanistan Habibullah Khan is murdered during a hunting trip.
- 1921 – The movie The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, starring Rudolph Valentino, premieres.
- 1929 - American Samoa becomes a US Territory.
- 1931 – California gets the go-ahead by the United States Congress to build the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.
- 1933 - United States Congress proposes the 21st Amendment to the United States Constitution, which will end Alcohol Prohibition.
- 1935 - Caroline Mikkelsen becomes the first woman to set foot on the continent of Antarctica.
- 1942 – Lieutenant Edward O'Hare becomes America's first World War II flying ace.
- 1943 – American movie studio executives agree to allow the Office of War Information to censor movies.
- 1943 – The Paricutín volcano begins to form in Paricutín, México.
- 1944 – World War II: "Big Week" begins with American bomber raids on Nazi aircraft manufacturing centers.
- 1944 – World War II: The United States takes Eniwetok Island.
- 1952 – Emmett L. Ashford becomes the first African-American umpire in organized baseball by being authorized to be a substitute umpire in the Southwestern International League.
- 1952 – The movie The African Queen opens at the Capitol Theatre in New York City.
- 1959 – The Avro Arrow programme to design and manufacture supersonic jet fighters in Canada is cancelled by the Diefenbaker government amid much political debate.
- 1962 – Mercury program: While aboard Friendship 7, John Glenn orbits the earth three times in 4 hours, 55 minutes, becoming the first American to orbit the Earth.
- 1965 – Ranger 8 crashes into the Moon after a successful mission of photographing possible landing sites for the Apollo program astronauts.
- 1974 – Science fiction writer Philip K. Dick claims he began experiencing intense gnostic visions on this date.
- 1976 – The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization disbands.
- 1978 - The last Order of Victory is given to Leonid Brezhnev.
- 1986 - Silvio Berlusconi takes over AC Milan.
- 1987 – Unabomber: In Salt Lake City, in the USA, a bomb explodes in a computer store.
- 1988 - Nagorno Karabakh votes to separate from Azerbaijan and join Armenia. War breaks out soon after.
- 1989 - An IRA bomb destroys a section of the British Army Barracks at Ternhill, England.
- 1991 - The giant statue of Albanian leader Enver Hoxha is brought down in Tirana by protestors.
- 1992 – Ross Perot announces his intention to run in the 1992 U.S. presidential election on CNN's Larry King Live.
- 1992 – The FA Premier League is formed and takes over as the professional league in England from season 1992–93.
- 1993 - New Scientist magazine reports the discovery of the youngest-observed star. Named VLA 1623, it is around 10,000 years old.
- 1998 – The afternoon newspaper Nashville Banner publishes its final edition.
- 2001 – FBI agent Robert Hanssen is arrested and charged with spying for Russia for 15 years.
- 2002 – In Reqa Al-Gharbiya, Egypt, a fire on a train injures over 65 and kills at least 370.
- 2003 – In Rhode Island, in the USA, The Station nightclub fire kills about 100 and injures over 200.
- 2005 – Spain becomes the first country to vote in a referendum on ratification of the proposed Constitution of the European Union, passing it by a substantial margin, but on a low turnout.
- 2005 – Jeff Gordon wins his third Daytona 500.
- 2010 – Floods and mudslides hit the Portuguese island of Madeira, killing 43 people.
Other websites[change]
February 19 – February 21 – January 20 – March 20 – listing of all days
