Famous birthdays, deaths and events of August 20
Birthdays
- 1517 - Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle, French church leader (d. 1586)
- 1561 - Jacopo Peri, Italian composer (d. 1633)
- 1625 - Thomas Corneille, French dramatist (d. 1709)
- 1632 - Louis Bourdaloue, French Jesuit preacher (d. 1704)
- 1710 - Thomas Simpson, British mathematician (d. 1761)
- 1719 - Charles-François de Broglie, marquis de Ruffec
- 1719 - Christian Mayer, Czech astronomer (d. 1783)
- 1776 - Bernardo O'Higgins, South American revolutionary (d. 1842)
- 1779 - Jöns Jakob Berzelius, Swedish chemist (d. 1848)
- 1833 - Benjamin Harrison, 23rd President of the United States (d. 1901)
- 1845 - St. Albert Chmielowski, Polish Catholic Saint (d. 1916)
- 1847 - Andrew Greenwood, England cricketer (d. 1889)
- 1847 - Bolesław Prus, Polish writer (d. 1912)
- 1856 - Jakub Bart-Ćišinski, Sorbian writer (d. 1909)
- 1860 - Raymond Poincaré, French statesman (d. 1934)
- 1865 - Bernard Tancred, South African cricketer (d. 1911)
- 1868 - Ellen Roosevelt, American tennis player (d. 1954)
- 1873 - Gottlieb Eliel Saarinen, Finnish architect (d. 1950)
- 1881 - Edgar Guest, English poet (d. 1959)
- 1886 - Paul Tillich, German-American theologian (d. 1965)
- 1890 - H. P. Lovecraft, American writer (d. 1937)
- 1897 - Tarjei Vesaas, Norwegian writer (d. 1970)
- 1898 - Vilhelm Moberg, Swedish author and historian (d. 1973)
- 1901 - Salvatore Quasimodo, Italian writer
- 1905 - Jean Gebser, German-born author
- 1905 - Jack Teagarden, American musician (d. 1964)
- 1907 - Alan Reed, original voice of Fred Flintstone. (d. 1977)
- 1908 - Al Lopez, American baseball player and manager (d. 2005)
- 1909 - Alby Roberts, New Zealand cricketer (d. 1978)
- 1910 - Eero Saarinen, Finnish architect (d. 1961)
- 1913 - Roger Wolcott Sperry, American neurobiologist
- 1916 - Paul Felix Schmidt, Estonian–German chess player (d. 1984)
- 1918 - Jacqueline Susann, American novelist (d. 1974)
- 1921 - Jack Wilson, Australian cricketer (d. 1985)
- 1923 - Jim Reeves, American singer (d. 1964)
- 1926 - Nobby Wirkowski, American and Canadian football player and coach
- 1927 - Geriatric1927, English video blogger
- 1927 - Yootha Joyce, English actress (d. 1980)
- 1930 - Mario Bernardi, Canadian conductor
- 1931 - Don King, American boxing promoter
- 1932 - Anthony Ainley, British actor (d. 2004)
- 1932 - Vasily Aksyonov, Russian novelist
- 1932 - Atholl McKinnon, South African cricketer (d. 1983)
- 1933 - George J. Mitchell, former United States Senator
- 1934 - Armi Kuusela, Finnish beauty queen
- 1935 - Ron Paul, US Congressman
- 1936 - Hideki Shirakawa, Japanese chemist
- 1937 - Jim Bowen, English comedian
- 1937 - El Fary, Spanish singer and actor (d. 2007)
- 1937 - Andrei Konchalovsky, Russian film director
- 1938 - Alain Vivien, French politician
- 1939 - Fernando Poe Jr., Filipino actor and politician (d. 2004)
- 1940 - Rubén Hinojosa, American politician
- 1940 - Rex Sellers, Australian cricketer
- 1941 - Dave Brock, British musician and founder of Hawkwind
- 1941 - Rich Brooks, American football coach
- 1941 - Slobodan Milošević, President of Serbia and of Yugoslavia (d. 2006)
- 1941 - Robin Oakley, British journalist
- 1941 - Jo Ramirez, Mexican motor racing team manager and author
- 1942 - Isaac Hayes, American singer
- 1942 - Fred Norman, American baseball player
- 1943 - Sylvester McCoy, Scottish actor
- 1944 - Rajiv Gandhi, Prime Minister of India (d. 1991)
- 1944 - Graig Nettles, American baseball player
- 1946 - Connie Chung, American journalist
- 1946 - Ralf Hütter, German musician (Kraftwerk)
- 1946 - N.R. Narayana Murthy, Indian businessman
- 1947 - Alan Lee, English conceptual artist
- 1948 - John Noble, Australian actor
- 1948 - Robert Plant, British Musician (Led Zeppelin)
- 1949 - Nikolas Asimos, Greek composer and singer (d. 1988)
- 1949 - Norman Featherstone, South African cricketer
- 1949 - Alan Hardwick, English TV presenter
- 1949 - Phil Lynott, Irish musician (d. 1986)
- 1951 - Greg Bear, American author
- 1952 - John Emburey, English cricketer
- 1952 - Doug Fieger, American musician (The Knack)
- 1952 - John Hiatt, American musician
- 1954 - Tawn Mastrey, American disc jockey (d. 2007)
- 1954 - Al Roker, American television personality
- 1954 - Don Stark, American actor
- 1955 - Agnes Chan, Hong Kong singer and writer
- 1956 - Joan Allen, American actress
- 1956 - Alvin Greenidge, West Indian cricketer
- 1957 - Finlay Calder, Scottish rugby player
- 1958 - Patricia Rozema, Canadian film director and screenwriter
- 1961 - Greg Egan, Australian author
- 1961 - Joe Pasquale, English comedian
- 1962 - Sophie Aldred, English actress
- 1962 - James Marsters, American actor
- 1962 - Dong-Wook Song, South Korean tennis player
- 1965 - KRS-One, American rapper
- 1966 - Dimebag Darrell, American guitarist (Pantera and Damageplan) (d. 2004)
- 1967 - Andy Benes, American baseball player
- 1967 - Colin Cunningham, American actor
- 1967 - Terri Poch, American yogini and former professional wrestler
- 1968 - Klas Ingesson, Swedish footballer
- 1968 - Yuri Shiratori, Japanese voice actress and singer
- 1969 - Duke Droese, American professional wrestler
- 1970 - Els Callens, Belgian tennis player
- 1970 - John D. Carmack, American computer game programmer
- 1970 - Fred Durst, American singer (Limp Bizkit)
- 1971 - Brad Avery, American musician (former guitarist for Third Day)
- 1971 - Jonathan Ke Quan, Vietnamese American actor
- 1971 - Steve Stone, English footballer
- 1971 - David Walliams, British comedian
- 1972 - Chaney Kley, American actor
- 1973 - Todd Helton, American baseball player
- 1974 - Amy Adams, American actress
- 1974 - Big Moe, American rapper (d. 2007)
- 1974 - Szabolcs Sáfár, Hungarian footballer
- 1974 - Andy Strachan, Australian musician (The Living End)
- 1974 - Maxim Vengerov, Russian violinist
- 1975 - Marcus Mastin, American author
- 1976 - Chris Drury, American hockey player
- 1977 - Felipe Contepomi, Argentine rugby player
- 1977 - Manuel Contepomi, Argentine rugby player
- 1977 - Ivar Ingimarsson, Icelandic footballer
- 1977 - Mayra Veronica, Cuban model and actress
- 1977 - James Ormond, England cricketer
- 1979 - Cory Sullivan, American baseball player
- 1980 - Corey Carrier, American actor
- 1980 - Rochelle Gadd, British actress
- 1981 - Benjamin Barnes, English actor (Prince Caspian)
- 1981 - Bernard Mendy, French footballer
- 1982 - Cléber Luis Alberti, Brazilian footballer
- 1982 - Youssouf Hersi, Ethiopian footballer
- 1982 - Joshua Kennedy, Australian footballer
- 1982 - Barney Rogers, Zimbabwean cricketer
- 1984 - Mirai Moriyama, Japanese actor
- 1984 - Golan Yosef, Dutch actor
- 1986 - Robert Clark, Canadian actor
- 1987 - Cătălina Ponor, Romanian gymnast
- 1990 - Ranomi Kromowidjojo, Dutch swimmer
- 1991 - Marko Đoković, Serbian tennis player
- 1992 - Demi Lovato, American actress and singer
- 2003 - Prince Gabriel of Belgium,
Deaths
- 535 - Mochta of Louth, disciple of St. Patrick
- 984 - Pope John XIV,
- 1384 - Geert Groote, Dutch founder of the Brethren of the Common Life (b. 1340)
- 1572 - Miguel López de Legazpi, Spanish conquistador (b. 1502)
- 1580 - Jeronymo Osorio, Portuguese historian (b. 1506)
- 1611 - Tomás Luis de Victoria, Spanish composer (b. 1548)
- 1639 - Martin Opitz von Boberfeld, German poet (b. 1597)
- 1643 - Anne Hutchinson, English Puritan preacher (b. 1591)
- 1648 - Edward Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury
- 1672 - Johan de Witt, Dutch politician (b. 1625)
- 1672 - Cornelis de Witt, Dutch politician (b. 1623)
- 1680 - William Bedloe, English informer (b. 1650)
- 1701 - Charles Sedley, English playwright (b. 1639)
- 1707 - Nicolas Gigault, French organist and composer (b. 1627)
- 1773 - Enrique Florez, Spanish historian (b. 1701)
- 1811 - Louis Antoine de Bougainville, French explorer (b. 1729)
- 1823 - Pope Pius VII, (b. 1740)
- 1825 - William Waldegrave, 1st Baron Radstock
- 1887 - Jules Laforgue, French poet (b. 1860)
- 1904 - René Waldeck-Rousseau, French statesman (b. 1846)
- 1912 - William Booth, English founder of the Salvation Army (b. 1829)
- 1914 - Pope Pius X, (b. 1835)
- 1915 - Paul Ehrlich, German scientist
- 1917 - Adolf von Baeyer, German chemist
- 1919 - Greg MacGregor, England cricketer (b. 1869)
- 1930 - Charles Bannerman, Australian cricketer (b. 1851)
- 1959 - William Halsey, Jr
- 1961 - Percy Williams Bridgman, American physicist
- 1963 - Joan Voûte, Dutch astronomer (b. 1879)
- 1965 - Jonathan Myrick Daniels, Civil Rights Martyr (b. 1939)
- 1971 - Rashid Minhas, Pakistani Air Force pilot (b. 1951)
- 1980 - Joe Dassin, American singer (b. 1938)
- 1982 - Ulla Jacobsson, Swedish actress (b. 1929)
- 1986 - Milton Acorn, Canadian poet (b. 1923)
- 1989 - George Adamson, India-born English game warden and lion expert (b. 1906)
- 1993 - Bernard Delfgaauw, Dutch philosopher (b. 1912)
- 1997 - Norris Bradbury, American physicist (b. 1909)
- 1997 - Léon Dion, French-Canadian political scientist (b. 1922)
- 1998 - Raquel Rastenni, Danish singer (b. 1915)
- 2001 - Sir Fred Hoyle, English astronomer and science fiction writer (b. 1915)
- 2001 - Kim Stanley, American actress (b. 1925)
- 2005 - Thomas Herrion, American football player (b. 1981)
- 2005 - Krzysztof Raczkowski, Polish drummer (b. 1970)
- 2006 - Claude Blanchard, French-Canadian singer
- 2006 - Joe Rosenthal, American photographer (b. 1911)
- 2006 - Cpl Bryan Budd VC, British soldier (Afghanistan) (b. 1977)
- 2007 - Leona Helmsley, American hotel operator and real estate investor (b. 1920)
- 2007 - Larry Hartsell, American martial artist
- 2008 - Hua Guofeng, former Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party
- 2008 - Stephanie Tubbs Jones, American politician (b. 1949)
- 2008 - Gene Upshaw, American football player and union leader (b. 1945)
Events
- 636 - Battle of Yarmouk: Arab forces led by Khalid ibn al-Walid take control of Syria and Palestine away from the Byzantine Empire, marking the first great wave of Muslim conquests and the rapid advance of Islam outside Arabia.
- 917 - Battle of Anchialus: Tsar Simeon I of Bulgaria invades Thrace and drives the Byzantines out.
- 1000 - The foundation of the Hungarian state, Hungary is established as a Christian kingdom by Stephen I of Hungary.
- 1391 - Konrad von Wallenrode becomes the 24th Hochmeister of the Teutonic Order.
- 1672 - Former Grand Pensionary Johan de Witt and his brother Cornelis are brutally murdered by an angry mob in The Hague.
- 1775 - The Spanish establish a presidio (fort) in the town that became Tucson, Arizona.
- 1794 - Battle of Fallen Timbers
- 1804 - Lewis and Clark Expedition: the "Corps of Discovery", exploring the Louisiana Purchase, suffers its only death when sergeant Charles Floyd dies, apparently from acute appendicitis.
- 1858 - Charles Darwin first publishes his theory of evolution in The Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London, alongside Alfred Russel Wallace's same theory.
- 1866 - President Andrew Johnson formally declares the American Civil War over.
- 1882 - Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture debuts in Moscow.
- 1888 - Mutineers imprison Emin Pasha at Dufile.
- 1900 - Japan's primary school law is amended to provide for four years of mandatory schooling.
- 1914 - World War I: German forces occupy Brussels.
- 1920 - The first commercial radio station, 8MK (WWJ), begins operations in Detroit, Michigan.
- 1926 - Japan's public broadcasting company, Nippon Hōsō Kyōkai(NHK) is established.
- 1938 - Lou Gehrig hits his 23rd career grand slam
- 1940 - In Mexico City exiled Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky is fatally wounded with an ice axe by Ramon Mercader. He dies the next day.
- 1944 - World War II: the Battle of Romania begins with a major Soviet offensive.
- 1953 - The Soviet Union publicly acknowledges that it had tested a hydrogen bomb.
- 1955 - In Morocco, a force of Berbers from the Atlas Mountains region of Algeria raid two rural settlements and kill 77 French nationals.
- 1960 - Senegal breaks from the Mali federation, declaring its independence.
- 1968 - 200,000 Warsaw Pact troops and 5,000 tanks invade Czechoslovakia to end the "Prague Spring" of political liberalization.
- 1975 - Viking Program: NASA launches the Viking 1 planetary probe toward Mars.
- 1977 - Voyager Program: NASA launches the Voyager 2 spacecraft.
- 1979 - The East Coast Main Line rail route between England and Scotland is restored when the Penmanshiel Diversion opens.
- 1982 - Lebanese Civil War: a multinational force lands in Beirut to oversee the PLO's withdrawal from Lebanon.
- 1986 - In Edmond, Oklahoma, U.S. Postal employee Patrick Sherrill guns down 14 of his co-workers and then commits suicide.
- 1988 - "Black Saturday" of the Yellowstone fire in Yellowstone National Park
- 1988 - Peru becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.
- 1988 - Iran–Iraq War: a cease-fire is agreed after almost eight years of war.
- 1991 - Collapse of the Soviet Union, August Coup: more than 100,000 people rally outside the Soviet Union's parliament building protesting the coup aiming to depose President Mikhail Gorbachev.
- 1991 - Estonia secedes from the Soviet Union.
- 1993 - After rounds of secret negotiations in Norway, the Oslo Peace Accords are signed, followed by a public ceremony in Washington, D.C. the following month.
- 1997 - Souhane massacre in Algeria; over 60 people are killed and 15 kidnapped.
- 1998 - The Supreme Court of Canada rules that Quebec cannot legally secede from Canada without the federal government's approval.
- 1998 - U.S. embassy bombings: the United States military launches cruise missile attacks against alleged al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan and a suspected chemical plant in Sudan in retaliation for the August 7 bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. The al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum is destroyed in the attack.
- 2002 - A group of Iraqis opposed to the regime of Saddam Hussein take over the Iraqi Embassy in Berlin for five hours before releasing their hostages and surrendering.
- 2008 - Spanair Flight 5022, from Madrid to Gran Canaria, skids off the runway and crashes at Barajas Airport. 146 people are killed in the crash, 8 more die afterwards. Only 18 people survive.
- 2009 - Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, imprisoned for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, is released by the Scottish government on compassionate grounds as he has terminal prostate cancer. He returns to his native Libya.
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