What Happened On
Jaws
June 20, 1975
Jaws, the movie that terrified us of the deep, is released. Reduced beach attendance in 1975 was attributed to this movie. Jaws also established the tradition of the summer blockbuster action movie and changed the way movies were marketed. Previously, movies were released only in several markets and then slowly released across the country as support for the movie grew. Jaws changed that by opening in hundreds of theaters backed by massive TV advertising. A desire for a quick return in profits led other movies to soon follow suit.
It was originally intended to have more shark scenes, but the mechanical shark kept malfunctioning, so director Steven Spielberg chose to simply suggest the shark's presence while playing ominous music.
It was based on the book by Peter Benchley and in 1978 became the first laserdisc movie released in North America.
Washington-Moscow Hotline
June 20, 1963
The famous "hotline" direct communications line between the U.S. and the Soviet Union is ordered. The need for the line was realized during the Cuban Missile Crisis when it could take up to six hours to deliver diplomatic messages. It took the United States nearly twelve hours to receive and decode Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev's 3,000-word initial settlement message. By that time, Moscow had sent a tougher message. The belief was that a faster reply could have avoided this.
Although it became known as the "Red Phone", it was never actually a telephone line, and no red phones were ever used. The first implementation used Teletype equipment, and then fax machines in 1986. In 2008 it became a secure computer link over which email messages are sent.
First Black to Win an Emmy
June 20, 1960
Harry Belafonte wins for his variety special Tonight with Belafonte.
The Ed Sullivan Show
June 20, 1948
The Ed Sullivan Show debuts live on CBS, hosted by Ed Sullivan. It was originally named The Toast of the Town. The first guests included comedians Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, singer Monica Lewis, and Broadway composers Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II previewing the score to South Pacific, which premiered the following year.
V-2 test launch in 1943
Photo Credit: Bundesarchiv, Bild 141-1880
V-2 test launch in 1943Photo Credit: Bundesarchiv, Bild 141-1880
First Man-Made Object in Space
June 20, 1944
A German V-2 rocket crosses the Kármán line, making it the first man-made object to travel in space.
Germany began using the rockets in 1944, striking London and Antwerp. Traveling at the speed of sound, they were virtually impossible to stop.
The Kármán line defines the boundary between Earth's atmosphere and outer space, and is defined as beginning 62 miles (100 kilometers) above sea level. It is named after Hungarian-American engineer and physicist Theodore von Kármán (1881-1963), who in 1957 was the first person to attempt to derive such an altitude limit.
Detroit Race Riot
June 20, 1943
Two days of violence begins in which 34 people are killed and 700 injured. Six thousand federal troops were brought in to suppress the riots. The riots started after a false rumor spread that a mob of whites had thrown an African-American mother and her baby into the Detroit River. Blacks looted and destroyed white property as retaliation. Another false rumor that blacks had raped and murdered a white woman on the Belle Isle Bridge swept through white neighborhoods. Soon mobs of both races were attacking each other. A total of 34 people were killed, 25 of them black and most at the hands of white police or National Guardsmen. Racial tensions had been high over housing shortages due to Detroit automobile factories gearing up for World War II bringing in nearly 400,000 migrants, both black and white, from the Southeastern United States the previous two years. There had been regular protests of blacks moving into white communities.
He 176
He 176
First Rocket-Powered Airplane
June 20, 1939
The first airplane powered solely by a liquid-fueled rocket makes its first flight. It was the Heinkel He 176 created by German scientist Ernst Heinkel. Only one was ever built and it was destroyed by an Allied bombing raid during World War II in 1943.
Lizzie, her home, father, and stepmother murdered
Lizzie, her home, father, and stepmother murdered
Lizzie Borden Murders
June 20, 1893
Lizzie Borden is acquitted for the murders of her father and stepmother. They had been axed to death in their home the previous year.
"Lizzie Borden took an axe
And gave her mother forty whacks.
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one."
Painting of SS Savannah by Hunter Wood (1819)
Painting of SS Savannah by Hunter Wood (1819)
First Steamboat to Cross the Atlantic
June 20, 1819
The SS Savannah arrives in Liverpool, England. It had left Georgia 29 days earlier. The Savannah was a hybrid sailing ship/sidewheel steamer. Most of the voyage was made under sail power, using her engines for less than 90 hours of the 29-day voyage. And even with lavish accommodations and much publicity, the Savannah was unable to find willing passengers or cargo and had to make the trip with only the crew. Even after her historic voyage, the large amount of room needed for the steam engine and its fuel at the expense of cargo room made the Savannah a commercial failure.
Great Seal of the U.S.
June 20, 1782
The U.S. adopts the seal bearing a spread eagle with the motto "E Pluribus Unum" (Out of many, one).
Black Hole of Calcutta
June 20, 1756
145 male British prisoners of war and a woman are forced to spend the night in this prison cell known as the Black Hole of Calcutta - Only 22 men and the woman survived the night. The cell was only 14 feet x 18 feet (4.30m. × 5.50m) wide with only two small windows and was intended to hold only 2-3 people at a time. They were imprisoned at 8pm and within an hour people were passing out and falling to the floor where they were then trampled to death. When released at 6 am the next morning, all but 22 men and the woman had died.
This occurred during the war between Britain and France.
Airline Mishaps
June 20, 1980
A Delta Airlines flight lands at MacDill Air Force base in Florida; the pilot thought he was in Tampa.
Muhammad Ali
June 20, 1967
The boxing legend Muhammad Ali is fined $10,000, sentenced to 5 years in prison for draft evasion. He was also stripped of his boxing heavyweight title.
His conviction was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1971.
First Boxer to Regain World Heavyweight Title
June 20, 1960
Floyd Patterson knocks out Ingemar Johansson.
West Virginia
June 20, 1863
West Virginia becomes the 35th state.
Telegraph
June 20, 1840
Samuel F.B. Morse receives a patent for his improvements to the telegraph. He would send the first telegraph message, "What hath God wrought", in 1844.
Queen Victoria
June 20, 1837
Queen Victoria succeeds to the British throne. She would reign until her death in 1901.
Maryland
June 20, 1632
A Charter for Maryland Colony is granted to Cecilius Calvert (second Lord Baltimore).
Birthdays
Audie Murphy
Born June 20, 1925 d. 1971
American war hero, actor. He was the most decorated American combat solider of World War II; he received the Medal of Honor along with numerous other decorations. He single-handedly held off advancing Germans for an hour by manning a burning tank while under direct fire. He was wounded in the attack, but continued until he ran out of ammunition.
Chet Atkins
Born June 20, 1924 d. 2001
American guitarist, Grammy-winning, Country Music and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer. He sold over 30 million records and is credited with creating the "Nashville sound." He initially had difficulty learning the electric guitar because his childhood home didn't have electricity (according to his autobiography Country Gentleman).
Errol Flynn
Born June 20, 1909 d. 1959
Australian-born American swashbuckling actor, known for both his on and off-screen performances. He was tried and acquitted in 1943 for statutory rape of two 17-year-old girls, resulting in the phrase "in like Flynn."
Nicole Kidman
Born June 20, 1967
Australian Oscar-winning actress. Film: Batman Forever (1995, Dr. Chase Meridian).
John Taylor
Born June 20, 1960
English bass guitarist, actor, with Duran Duran (1978-97). Music: Hungry Like the Wolf (1982), Rio (1982), Union of the Snake (1983), and A View to a Kill (1985).
Michael Anthony (Michael Anthony Sobolewski)
Born June 20, 1954
American guitarist, with Van Halen. Music: Runnin' With the Devil (1976) and Jump (1984, #1).
Larry Riley
Born June 20, 1952 d. 1992
American actor. TV: Knotts Landing (Frank Williams).
John Goodman
Born June 20, 1952
American actor. TV: Roseanne (Dan).
Lionel Richie
Born June 20, 1949
American singer. Music: Three Times a Lady (1978, #1) and Say You, Say Me (1985, #1).
Anne Murray
Born June 20, 1945
Canadian Grammy-winning singer. Music: You Needed Me (1979, #1, Grammy). She was the first female Canadian vocalist to earn a U.S. gold record (1970, Snowbird).
Brian Wilson
Born June 20, 1942
American musician, with The Beach Boys. Music: Surfin' USA (1963), I Get Around (1964, #1), Help Me Rhonda, (1965, #1), and Good Vibrations (1966, #1).
John Mahoney
Born June 20, 1940 d. 2018
English-American actor. TV: Frasier (1993-2004, Martin Crane).
Danny Aiello
Born June 20, 1933 d. 2019
American actor. Film: Once Upon a Time in America (1984), The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985), Moonstruck (1987), Harlem Nights (1989), and Do the Right Thing (1989, the pizzeria owner).
Photo Credit: Montclair Film
Photo Credit: Montclair Film
Olympia Dukakis
Born June 20, 1931 d. 2021
American Oscar-winning actress. Film: Moonstruck (1987, Oscar) and Steel Magnolias (1989).
Martin Landau
Born June 20, 1928 d. 2017
American Oscar-winning actor. TV: Mission: Impossible (1966-69, Make-up artist Rollin Hand). Film: Ed Wood (1994, Bela Lugosi).
Deaths
Photo Credit: Life
Photo Credit: Life
Edith Shain
Died June 20, 2010 b. 1918
American nurse. She claims to be the recipient of the sailor's kiss in Alfred Eisenstaedt's famous Times Square photo on V-J Day in 1945. It is also believed that Glenn McDuffie was the sailor in the photo.
Electron microscope image of influenza virus
Electron microscope image of influenza virus
Discovered Viruses
Dmitry Iosifovich Ivanovsky
Died June 20, 1920 b. 1864
Russian biologist, discover of viruses. He was studying a tobacco crop disease when he found that an invisible parasite, much smaller than any known bacterium, was the cause. This newly-discovered life form was the virus (1892).
Donald Sutherland
Died June 20, 2024 b. 1935
Canadian Emmy-winning actor. Film: The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970, Hawkeye), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Don't Look Now (1973), National Lampoon's Animal House (1978), and Ordinary People (1980).
Jack St. Clair Kilby
Died June 20, 2005 b. 1923
Nobel-winning electrical engineer. Jack Kilby invented the first hybrid integrated circuit in 1958 made of germanium. Kilby is also the inventor of the handheld calculator and the thermal printer.
Robert Noyce invented the monolithic integrated circuit on silicon in 1959. Noyce's was more practical than Kilby's implementation and modern ICs are based on Noyce's design.
Ina Balin (Ina Rosenberg)
Died June 20, 1990 b. 1937
American actress. She portrayed herself in the TV movie The Children of An Lac (1980), which was based on her experiences touring with USO in Vietnam, where she aided in the evacuation of orphans during the fall of Saigon. She would go on to adopt three of the orphans.
Howard Johnson
Died June 20, 1972 b. 1897
American businessman. He founded the restaurant, ice-cream, and hotel chains.
Father Georges-Henri Lemaître
Died June 20, 1966 b. 1894
Belgian astronomer, Roman Catholic Priest. He first proposed what later became known as the Big Bang to explain the origin of the Universe (1931). He called his theory the "hypothesis of the primeval atom" or the "Cosmic Egg." Albert Einstein initially derided his theories, but later stated that not accepting them was the greatest error of his life. He was the very first recipient of the Eddington Medal award of the Royal Astronomical Society.
Bernard Mannes Baruch
Died June 20, 1965 b. 1870
American stock broker. He was an advisor to every president from Woodrow Wilson to John F. Kennedy.
Clara Zetkin
Died June 20, 1933 b. 1857
German communist leader, women's rights activist. She created the International Women's Day, which has been celebrated on March 8th since 1910.
Josef Breuer
Died June 20, 1925 b. 1842
Austrian physician. His work formed the foundation of modern psychoanalysis.
William IV
Died June 20, 1837 b. 1765
King of England (1830-37).
Founder of St. Louis
Pierre Laclède
Died June 20, 1778 b. 1729
French-born American fur trader. Founder of St. Louis (1764).
Georg Christian Füchsel
Died June 20, 1773 b. 1722
German geologist. He originated the concept of strata, rock layers that each represent a certain epoch of time.
Willem Barentsz
Died June 20, 1597 b. circa 1550
Dutch navigator. Discovered Spitzbergen and Bear Island (1596) and for whom the Barents Sea is named.
Louis I
Died June 20, 840 b. 778
Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire (814-840).