Thursday, August 20th
The 232nd day of 2009.
There are 133 days left in the year.
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Today's Highlights in History
On Aug. 20, 1968, the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the ''Prague Spring'' liberalization drive of Alexander Dubcek's regime. (Go to article.)
On Aug. 20, 1833, Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd president of the United States, was born. Following his death on March 13, 1901, his obituary appeared in The Times. (Go to obit. | Other Birthdays)
Editorial Cartoon of the Day
On August 20, 1904, Harper's Weekly featured a cartoon about the presidential election of 1904. (See the cartoon and read an explanation.)
On this date in:
1833 Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd president of the United States, was born in North Bend, Ohio.
1914 German forces occupied Brussels, Belgium, during World War I.
1918 Britain opened an offensive on the Western front during World War I.
1940 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill paid tribute to the Royal Air Force, saying, "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."
1953 The Soviet Union publicly acknowledged it had tested a hydrogen bomb.
1955 Hundreds of people were killed in anti-French rioting in Morocco and Algeria.
1964 President Lyndon B. Johnson signed a nearly $1 billion anti-poverty measure.
1977 The United States launched Voyager 2, an unmanned spacecraft carrying a 12-inch copper phonograph record containing greetings in dozens of languages, samples of music and sounds of nature.
1992 The Republican National Convention in Houston nominated President George H.W. Bush and Vice President Dan Quayle for a second term.
1998 Retaliating for deadly embassy bombings in East Africa, the United States launched cruise missile strikes against al-Qaida training camps in Afghanistan and what was described as a chemical plant in Sudan.
2006 Former Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal, who had taken the iconic Iwo Jima flag-raising picture during World War II, died at age 94.
2008 Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski signed a deal to put a U.S. missile defense base in Poland.
2008 Gene Upshaw, executive director of the NFL Players Association, died at age 63.
Current Birthdays
Al Roker turns 55 years old today.
AP Photo/Peter Kramer TV weatherman Al Roker ("Today") turns 55 years old today.
90 Walter Bernstein
Writer, director
76 George Mitchell
Former Senate majority leader
63 Connie Chung
Broadcast journalist
62 Jimmy Pankow
Rock musician (Chicago)
61 John Noble
Actor
61 Robert Plant
Rock singer (Led Zeppelin)
57 Doug Fieger
Rock singer (The Knack)
57 Rudy Gatlin
Country singer (The Gatlin Brothers)
57 John Hiatt
Rock singer, songwriter
56 Peter Horton
Actor, director
54 Jay Acovone
Actor
53 Joan Allen
Actress
47 James Marsters
Actor ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Angel")
44 KRS-One
Rapper
39 Fred Durst
Rock singer (Limp Bizkit)
38 Brad Avery
Rock musician
38 Jonathan Ke Quan
Actor
36 Todd Helton
Baseball player
34 Monique Powell
Rock singer (Save Ferris)
28 Ben Barnes
Actor
17 Demi Lovato
Actress
Historic Birthdays
Benjamin Harrison
8/20/1833 - 3/13/1901
23rd president of the United States
(Go to obit.)
71 Jacopo Peri
8/20/1561 - 8/12/1633
Italian composer
70 Francis Asbury
8/20/1745 - 3/31/1816
English-born bishop of the American Methodist Episcopal Church
76 Eliel Saarinen
8/20/1873 - 7/1/1950
Finnish architect
77 Edgar Guest
8/20/1881 - 8/5/1959
English-born American poet
66 Salvatore Quasimodo
8/20/1901 - 6/14/1968
Italian Nobel Prize-winning poet, critic and translator
58 Jack Teagarden
8/20/1905 - 1/15/1964
American jazz trombonist
80 Valentin Glushko
8/20/1908 - 1/10/1989
Soviet rocket scientist
88 Kingsley Davis
8/20/1908 - 2/27/1997
American sociologist and demographer
51 Eero Saarinen
8/20/1910 - 9/1/1961
Finnish-born American architect
80 Roger Wolcott Sperry
8/20/1913 - 4/17/1994
American Nobel Prize-winning neurobiologist (1981)