Born on this day 20th February
1808 Honore Daumier
1925 Robert Altman
1927 Sidney Poitier
1940 Jimmy Greaves
1946 Brenda Blethyn
1951 Gordon Brown
1958 James Wilby
1961 Imogen Stubbs
1966 Cindy Crawford

Died on this day
1958 Thurston Hall
2001 Ronnie Hilton

Music

1954 Doris Day reached the top of the US singles chart with ‘Secret Love’.

1958 The Big Gold Record tour began, starring legends including Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, The Everly Brothers and Bill Haley.

1965 The Kinks reached the Number One position in the UK with ‘Tired Of Waiting For You’, while topping the chart in the US were Gerry Lewis and the Playboys with ‘Diamond Ring’.

1973 The Rolling Stones played at the Memorial Park Drive in Adelaide.

1984 Roger Daltrey appeared in Shakespeare’s ‘A Comedy Of Errors’ on US television.

Sport

1992 German boxing promoter Eberhard Thust was sentenced to 3 years imprisonment for blackmailing the father of tennis star Steffi Graf over a love affair with a photographer’s model

People & Showbiz

1990 Serif Cowells, who manufactured the board game ‘Trivial Pursuit’ issued an apology to the Secretary of State for Health, Kenneth Clarke, over a quotation which was mistakenly credited to him in a question: “Which health minister thought that immigrants to Britain came from Bongo Bongo Land?”. The answer should have been Alan Clark.

1992 The Queen arrived in Sydney to open the 50th parliament of New South Wales.

1995 93 year old Princess Alice moved from her home at Barnwell Manor near Peterborough to Kensington Palace in London.

General Events

1947 The government announced that Britain was to leave India, with Lord Mountbatten appointed the last Viceroy, succeeding Field Marshal Lord Wavell.

1962 American astronaut John Glenn became the first American to circle the earth three times in his space capsule Friendship 7 during a five hour flight.

1985 Margaret Thatcher announced her support for the American Star Wars project when she went before Congress, and appealed for Americans to end their support for the IRA.

1988 It was reported that a businessman in Chingford, Essex, had been given three weeks to demolish a £250,000 bungalow which he had built on land near his home in defiance of a court order obtained by his neighbour.

1989 Daryl Hart from Rotherhithe, east London, was accused of stealing a Steinway grand piano worth £25,000 from the lobby of the Festival Hall.

1991 Hundreds of palm trees were planted in the Cornish seaside towns of St Ives and Penzance ‘to create the impression that the climate feels ten degrees