20 June History
- 451 - Roman and barbarian warriors halt Attila's army at the Catalaunian Plains in eastern France.
- 1397 - The Union of Kalmar unites Denmark, Sweden, and Norway under one monarch.
- 1756 - Nearly 150 British soldiers are imprisoned in the 'Black Hole' cell of Calcutta. Most die.
- 1793 - Eli Whitney applies for a cotton gin patent.
- 1819 - The paddle-wheel steamship Savannah arrives in Liverpool, England, after a voyage of 27 days and 11 hours–the first steamship to successfully cross the Atlantic.
- 1837 - 18-year-old Victoria is crowned Queen of England.
- 1863 - President Abraham Lincoln admits West Virginia into the Union as the 35th state.
- 1898 - On the way to the Philippines to fight the Spanish, the U.S. Navy seizes the island of Guam.
- 1901 - Charlotte M. Manye of South Africa becomes the first native African to graduate from an American University.
- 1910 - Mexican President Porfirio Diaz proclaims martial law and arrests hundreds.
- 1920 - Race riots in Chicago, Illinois leave two dead and many wounded.
- 1923 - France announces it will seize the Rhineland to assist Germany in paying her war debts.
- 1941 - The U.S. Army Air Force is established, replacing the Army Air Corps.
- 1955 - The AFL and CIO agree to combine names for a merged group.
- 1963 - The United States and the Soviet Union agree to establish a hot line between Washington and Moscow.
- 1964 - General William Westmoreland succeeds General Paul Harkins as head of the U.S. forces in Vietnam.
- 1967 - Boxing champion Muhammad Ali is convicted of refusing induction into the American armed services.
- 1972 - President Richard Nixon names General Creigton Abrams as Chief of Staff of the United States Army.
- 1999 - NATO declares an official end to its bombing campaign of Yugoslavia.
20 June Birthdays
- 1723 - Adam Ferguson, Scottish historian and philopsopher (Principals of Moral and Political Science).
- 1858 - Charles Chesnutt, African-American novelist.
- 1887 - Kurt Schwitters, German artist.
- 1899 - Jean Moulin, French Resistance fighter during World War II.
- 1907 - Lillian Hellman, playwright (The Little Foxes, Toys in the Attic).
- 1909 - Errol Flynn, film actor (The Adventures of Robin Hood, Captain Blood).
- 1910 - Chester Arthur Burnett, blues singer.
- 1910 - Josephine Johnson, Pulitzer Prize-winning author (Jordanstown, Wildwood).
- 1924 - Chet Atkins, guitarist.
- 1924 - Audie Murphy, American soldier during World War II, author and actor.
- 1928 - Jean-Marie Le-Pen, leader of the National Front party in France.
- 1946 - Andre Watts, pianist.