Historical Events on September 20

Events 1 - 200 of 229

• 368 Emperor Valentinianus visits Nijmegen

• 622 Islamic Prophet Muhammed/Abu Bakr arrives in Jathrib (Medina)
• 1066 Battle of Fulford, Yorkshire: Harald III Hardrada of Norway defeats Northern Saxon Earls Edwin and Morcar

• 1258 Salisbury Cathedral inaugurated
• 1378 Robert de Geneve, "butcher of Cesena" crowned anti-pope Clemens VII

• 1530 Luther advises protestant monarch compromise
• 1565 Spaniards capture Fort Caroline Florida & massacre the French
• 1596 Diego de Montemayor founded the city of Monterrey in New Spain.
• 1602 Spanish held city of Grave surrenders to Maurice of Orange during Eighty Years' War
• 1604 Spanish army under Spinola recaptures Oostende

• 1664 Maryland passes 1st anti-amalgamation law to stop intermarriage of English women & black men


• 1674 2nd West Indies Company forms
• 1688 French troops occupies Palts
• 1697 Peace of Saki (ends 9 years war)
• 1737 Runner Edward Marshall completes his journey in the Walking Purchase forcing the cession of 1.2 million acres (4,860 km²) of Lenape-Delaware tribal land to the Pennsylvania Colony
• 1746 Bonnie Prince Charlie flees to France from Scotland

• 1787 Prince Willem V returns to Hague
• 1792 French defeat Prussians at Valmy
• 1793 British troops under Major-general Williamson lands on (French) Haiti
• 1814 "Star Spangled Banner" published as a song, lyrics by Francis Scott Key, tune by John Stafford Smith
• 1830 1st Negro Convention of Free Men agree to boycott slave-produced goods

• 1835 Farroupilha's Revolution begins in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.
• 1839 1st railroad in Netherland opens (Amsterdam-Haarlem)
• 1848 The American Association for the Advancement of Science is created.
• 1850 Slave trade abolished in DC, but slavery allowed to continue

• 1859 George Simpson patents electric range
• 1860 First British royalty to visit US, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII)
• 1861 Battle of Lexington, MI-captured by Union
• 1863 Battle of Shepardstown VA
• 1863 Civil War Battle of Chickamauga, near Chattanooga Tenn, ends

• 1871 Bishop John Coleridge Patteson martyred on the island of Nukapu, a Polynesian outlier island now in the Temotu province of the Solomon Islands. He was the first bishop of Melanesia.


• 1873 Panic sweeps NY Stock Exchange (railroad bond default/bank failure) NY shut banks for 10 days due to a bank scandal
• 1876 Ottawa Football Club forms
• 1877 Chase National Bank opens in NYC (later merges into Chase Manhattan)

• 1884 6.2 mile Arlberg railroad tunnel completed in Austria
• 1884 Equal Rights Party nominates female candidates for US President and Vice President
• 1893 The first gasoline-powered car debuts in Springfield, Massachusetts
• 1902 Chicago White Sox Jim Callahan no-hits Detroit Tigers, 3-0
• 1904 George Ade's "College Widow," premieres in NYC

• 1905 Cleveland makes AL record 7 errors in an inning
• 1906 Cunard Line's RMS Mauretania is launched at the Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson shipyard in Newcastle, England.
• 1907 Pitts Nick Maddox no-hits Bkln Dodgers, 2-1
• 1908 Chicago White Sox Frank Smith 2nd no-hitter, beats Philadelphia 1-0
• 1909 The British Parliament passes the South Africa Act; it calls for union of Cape Colony, Natal, Orange River Colony, and Transvaal; and both English and Dutch as official languages
• 1911 Yanks set team record 12 errors in a double header
• 1913 19th US Golf Open: Francis Ouimet shoots a 304 at The Country Club MA
• 1914 John Redmond urges Irish Volunteers to enlist in the British Army
• 1917 British assault on Polygon Forest, France
• 1917 Paraguay becomes a signatory to the Buenos Aires copyright treaty.
• 1918 Royal Dutch Blast furnace & Steel factory opens in Hague

• 1919 Booth Tarkington's "Clarence," premieres in NYC
• 1920 Foundation of the Spanish Legion.
• 1922 Goodman & Atteridge's musical "Passing Show," premieres in NYC
• 1922 Rogers Hornsby ends hitting streak of 33 games
• 1924 7th PGA Championship: Walter Hagen wins at French Lick CC, Indiana
• 1924 Carl Mays is 1st pitcher to win 20 games seasons for 3 different teams
• 1924 Cub's Grover Cleveland Alexander beats NY Giants to win 300th game

• 1930 Syro-Malankara Catholic Church is formed by Archbishop Mar Ivanios.

• 1932 Chicago Cubs clinch the NL pennant
• 1932 Dutch South Seas rebaptized in IJsselmeer

• 1933 Pittsburgh Steelers (as Pirates) play 1st NFL game, lose 23-2
• 1935 Pitts Crawfords beat NY Cubans to win Negro NL Championship, 3-0

• 1938 Emlyn Williams' "Corn is Green," premieres in London
• 1939 British navy captures German U-27 boat

• 1942 Gunther Hagg becomes world champ of all records from 1500m to 5000m
• 1943 Liberator bomber sinks U-338
• 1944 Nijmegen is liberated from German occupation
• 1944 Polish forces free Terneuzen Neth
• 1945 German rocket engineers begin work in US
• 1946 Churchill argues for a 'United States of Europe'
• 1948 "Magdalena" opens at Ziegfeld Theater NYC for 48 performances
• 1948 Mexican Baseball league disbanded
• 1949 Dutch Guilder devalued 30.3%
• 1949 Tennis player Pancho Gonzales turns professional
• 1951 1st North Pole jet crossing
• 1951 NL President Ford Frick elected 3rd commissioner of baseball
• 1951 Swiss males votes against female suffrage
• 1952 KPTV TV channel 12 in Portland, OR (IND) begins broadcasting

• 1954 1st FORTRAN computer program run
• 1954 1st National People's Congress adopts Chinese constitution
• 1954 KETC TV channel 9 in Saint Louis, MO (PBS) begins broadcasting
• 1954 Los Stravinsky's "In Memoriam Dylan Thomas," premieres in Angeles

• 1954 New Zealand's Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents reports just ten days after concluding hearings.

• 1955 Willie Mays is 7th player to reach 50 HRs in a season

• 1958 Baltimore Oriole knuckleball pitcher Hoyt Wilhelm no-hits NY Yankees 1-0
• 1958 Ferhat Abbas forms Algerian government in exile (Cairo)
• 1958 USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR


• 1960 UN General Assembly admit 13 African countries & Cyprus (96 nations)
• 1960 WFSU TV channel 11 in Tallahassee, FL (PBS) begins broadcasting
• 1961 After 84 1/3 innings Bill Fischer gives up a base on balls
• 1961 James Meredith refused enrollment to the segregated University of Mississippi
• 1961 USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR

• 1962 Ben Bella wins 1st elections in independent Algeria
• 1962 Mississippi Governor Ross Barnett refuses to admit an African-American, James Meredith, to Mississippi University

• 1964 Paramount Theater (NYC) presented the Beatles with Steve & Eydie
• 1965 WXXW (now WYCC) TV channel 20 in Chicago, IL (PBS) begins broadcasting
• 1966 US Surveyor B launched toward Moon; crashed Sept 23
• 1967 Benin separates from Nigeria
• 1967 British liner Queen Elizabeth II launched at Clydebank Scotland
• 1967 Hurricane Beulah hits Texas-Mexican border, kills 38
• 1967 WCAE TV channel 50 in St John, IN (PBS) begins broadcasting
• 1967 WCIX TV channel 6 in Miami, FL (CBS) begins broadcasting

• 1969 Virtual band Archies' single "Sugar Sugar" hits #1
• 1969 Pitts Pirate Bob Moose no-hits NY Mets, 4-0

• 1970 Soviet spcecraft Luna 16 lands on Moon's Mare Fecunditatis, drills core sample

• 1972 Libya acquires a 50 percent interest in two ENI oil concessions
• 1972 The Social Democratic and Labour Party issues a document entitled "Towards a New Ireland", proposing that the British and Irish governments should have joint sovereignty over Northern Ireland

• 1973 Willie Mays announces retirement at end of 1973 season

• 1975 Gary Sentman draws a record 176 lb longbow to a maximum 28½" draw
• 1976 Metroliner official opens in Brussels

• 1976 Sid Berstein offers $230 million charity concert for Beatle reunion
• 1977 "Estrada" opens at Majestic Theater NYC for 7 performances
• 1977 Vietnam & Djibouti ask for membership in UN
• 1978 "Eubie!" opens at Ambassador Theater NYC for 439 performances
• 1978 USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
• 1978 Yamada Mumon Roshi visits Benedictine Abbey of Maria Laach Germany

• 1979 Jose E dod Santos becomes president of Angola
• 1979 NASA launches HEAO 3
• 1979 Lee Iacocca is elected president of the Chrysler Corporation.
• 1979 The Punjab wing of the Unity Centre of Communist Revolutionaries of India (Marxist-Leninist) formally splits and constitutes a parallel UCCRI(ML).
• 1979 Assassination of French left-wing militant Pierre Goldman.
• 1980 Bronze plaque dedicated to memory of Thurman Munson at Yankee Stadium

• 1980 Spectacular Bid runs in Belmont alone as 3 horses drop out

• 1981 Ryder Cup Golf, Walton Heath GC: US wins 18½-9½; 6th and final Ryder Cup for Jack Nicklaus as a player; wins all 4 of his matches
• 1981 Joe Danelo kicks then NY Giant record 55 yard field goal
• 1982 Jalaluddin takes a one-day hat-trick Pakistan v Australia
• 1983 3,112 turn out to see Pirates play NY Mets at Shea Stadium
• 1983 Cryptographic Communications System & Method (RSA) patented
• 1984 "Cosby Show" premieres on NBC-TV
• 1984 Cubs break 2 million in home attendance for 1st time
• 1984 Suicide car bomb attacks US Embassy annex in Beirut, kills 23
• 1985 Curtis Strong is convicted for selling cocaine to pro baseball players
• 1985 Walt Disney World's 200-millionth guest
• 1986 Wichita State Shockers blow a 35-3 lead; lose 36-35 to Morehead State
• 1987 "Big River" closes at Eugene O'Neill Theater NYC after 1005 performances

• 1987 French driver Alain Prost wins Portuguese Grand Prix at Estoril; his record 28th Formula 1 victory
• 1987 San Francisco wide receiver Dwight Clark's NFL record streak of 105 consecutive games with a reception ends in 49ers 27-26 victory in Cincinnati

• 1988 Darrell Evans hits his 400th career home run
• 1988 American diver Greg Louganis wins the 3m springboard gold medal at the Seoul Olympics after famously hitting his head on the board the previous day
• 1988 Wade Boggs is 1st player to get 200 hits for 6 consecutive seasons
• 1988 "Loving Proof" 2nd studio album by Ricky Van Shelton is released (Billboard Song of the Year 1989)
• 1989 Musical "Miss Saigon," premieres in London
• 1989 USAir overshoots runway at LaGuardia Airport in NYC, 2 people die
• 1990 Both East and West Germany ratify reunification
• 1990 US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
• 1990 South Ossetia declares its independence from Georgia
• 1991 Lion's Terry Taylor reinstated after 1 year drug related suspension
• 1992 Colleen Walker wins LPGA SAFECO Golf Classic
• 1992 France votes in favor of Maastricht treaty
• 1992 Leanza Cornett (Florida), 21, crowned 66th Miss America 1993
• 1992 Phils' Mickey Moradini makes an unassisted triple play
• 1992 Space shuttle STS-47 (Endeavour 2) lands
• 1994 Space shuttle STS-64 (Discovery 20), lands
• 1995 Cincinnati Reds becomes 1st team to clinch NL Central
• 1997 Yanks clinch 37th appearance in post season, 3rd consecutive
• 1998 Solheim Cup Women's Golf, Muirfield Village: US retains Cup; beats Europe 16-12 for third consecutive victory

• 2000 Patent on RSA cryptograph algorithm ends
• 2000 The British MI6 Secret Intelligence Service building is attacked by a Russian-built Mark 22 anti-tank missile.

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