20 March History
- 1413 - Henry IV of England is succeed by his son Henry V.
- 1739 - In India, Nadir Shah of Persia occupies Delhi and takes possession of the Peacock throne.
- 1760 - The Great Fire of Boston destroys 349 buildings.
- 1792 - In Paris, the Legislative Assembly approves the use of the guillotine.
- 1815 - Napoleon Bonaparte enters Paris and begins his 100-day rule.
- 1841 - Edgar Allen Poe's The Murders in the Rue Morgue, considered the first detective story, is published.
- 1852 - Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin is published.
- 1906 - Army officers in Russia mutiny at Sevastopol.
- 1915 - The French call off the Champagne offensive on the Western Front.
- 1918 - The Bolsheviks of the Soviet Union ask for American aid to rebuild their army.
- 1922 - President Warren G. Harding orders U.S. troops back from the Rhineland.
- 1932 - The German dirigible, Graf Zepplin, makes the first flight to South America on regular schedule.
- 1939 - President Franklin D. Roosevelt names William O. Douglas to the Supreme Court.
- 1940 - The British Royal Air Force conducts an all-night air raid on the Nazi airbase at Sylt, Germany.
- 1943 - The Allies attack Field Marshall Erwin Rommel's forces on the Mareth Line in North Africa.
- 1965 - President Lyndon B. Johnson orders 4,000 troops to protect the Selma-Montgomery civil rights marchers.
- 1969 - Senator Edward Kennedy calls on the United States to close all bases in Taiwan.
- 1976 - Patty Hearst is convicted of armed robbery.
- 1982 - U.S. scientists return from Antarctica with the first land mammal fossils found there.
- 1987 - The United State approves AZT, a drug that is proven to slow the progress of AIDS.
20 March Birthdays
- 43BC - Ovid, Roman poet.
- 1811 - Napoleon II, son of Napoleon Bonaparte, Duke of Reichstadt.
- 1828 - Henrik Isben, Norwegian dramatist (Peer Gynt, Hedda Gabler).
- 1904 - B.F. Skinner, American psychologist.
- 1917 - Dame Vera Lynn , British singer.
- 1922 - Raymond Walter Goulding, Radio comedian of Bob and Ray fame.
- 1925 - John Ehrlichman, White House advisor to President Nixon.
- 1928 - Fred Rogers, television performer (Mr. Roger's Neighborhood).
- 1957 - Shelton 'Spike' Lee, film director (Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X).