October 20

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October 20 is the 293rd day of the year (294th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 72 days remaining.

1 Events
2 Births
3 Deaths
4 Holidays and observances
5 External links

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Events

1740 - Maria Theresa takes the throne of Austria. France, Prussia, Bavaria and Saxony refuse to honour the Pragmatic Sanction and the War of the Austrian Succession begins.
1803 - United States Senate ratifies the Louisiana Purchase.
1827 - Battle of Navarino - a combined Turkish and Egyptian armada is destroyed by an allied British, French, and Russian naval force in the port of Navarino in Pylos, Greece. The most important result of this battle is the end of the Greek Liberation War and the affirmation of independence of modern Greece.
1883 - Peru and Chile signed the Treaty of Ancón, by which the Tarapacá province was ceded to the latter, bringing an end to Peru's involvement in the War of the Pacific.
1910 - The hull of the RMS Olympic, sister-ship to the ill-fated RMS Titanic, is launched from the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast, Ireland.
1935 - The Long March ends
1944 - The Soviet army and Yugoslav Partisans liberate Belgrade, the capital of Yugoslavia
1944 - Liquid natural gas leaks from storange tanks in Cleveland, then explodes; the explosion and resulting fire level 30 blocks and kill 130.
1944 - General Douglas MacArthur fulfills his promise to return to the Philippines when he commands an Allied assult on the islands, reclaiming them from the Japanese during the Second World War.
1947 - The House Un-American Activities Committee begins its investigation into Communist infiltration of Hollywood, resulting in a blacklist that prevents some from working in the industry for years.
1955 - Publication of The Return of the King, being the last part of The Lord of the Rings
1968 - Former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy marries Greek shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis.
1971 - The Nepal stock exchange collapses.
1973 - The Saturday Night Massacre: President Nixon fires Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus after they refuse to fire Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox, who is finally fired by Robert Bork.
1973 - The Sydney Opera House opens.
1973 - The Six Million Dollar Man premieres on ABC.
1977 - A plane carrying Lynyrd Skynyrd crashes in Mississippi, killing several band members, including lead singer Ronnie Van Zant and guitarist Steve Gaines.
1979 - The John F Kennedy library is opened in Boston, Massachusetts.
1982 - St. Louis Cardinals defeat Milwaukee Brewers 6-3 to win their 9th World Series Championship.
1986 - Yitzhak Shamir begins his second office term as Israel's prime minister
1989 - Brisbane bound coach collides with semi-trailer north of Grafton in New South Wales, Australia. This is known as the Grafton Bus Crash
1991 - The Oakland Hills firestorm kills 25 and destroys 3469 homes and apartments, causing more than $2 billion in damage.
1995 - Filmmaker Kevin Smith releases Mallrats.
2004 - The Boston Red Sox win the American League pennant, defeating the New York Yankees 10-3 in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series, becoming the first team in major league baseball history to recover from a 3-0 postseason series deficit.
2004 - Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is sworn in as the President of Indonesia.