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Today in History: August 20, Soviets invade Czechoslovakia
Soviet and Warsaw Pact nations invaded Czechoslovakia; the action crushed the Prague Spring liberalization movement
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LA NACION
Today is Thursday, Aug. 20, the 232nd day of 2026. There are 133 days left in the year.
Today in history:
On Aug. 20, 1968, the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the “Prague Spring” liberalization movement.
Also on this date:
In 1858, Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution was first published in the “Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society.”
In 1862, the New York Tribune published an open letter by editor Horace Greeley calling on President Abraham Lincoln to take more aggressive measures to free enslaved people and end the South’s rebellion.
In 1866, President Andrew Johnson declared the official end of the Civil War.
In 1882, Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture” had its premiere in Moscow.
In 1910, a series of wildfires swept through parts of Idaho, Montana and Washington, killing at least 85 people and burning more than 4,600 square miles.
In 1920, the American Professional Football Conference was established by representatives of four professional football teams; two years later, with 18 teams, it would be renamed the National Football League.
In 1940, exiled Communist revolutionary Leon Trotsky was attacked in Coyoacan, Mexico by assassin Ramon Mercader. (Trotsky died the next day.)
In 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the Economic Opportunity Act, a nearly $1 billion anti-poverty measure.
In 1986, postal employee Patrick Henry Sherrill went on a deadly rampage at a post office in Edmond, Oklahoma, shooting 14 fellow workers to death before killing himself.
In 1989, 51 people died when the pleasure boat Marchioness sank in the River Thames in London after being struck by a dredger.
In 2012, after 80 years in existence, Georgia’s Augusta National Golf Club (home to the Masters Tournament) invited former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and South Carolina financier Darla Moore to become its first female members; both accepted.
In 2023, Tropical Storm Hilary struck Baja California , killing three and causing $15 million in damage.
Today’s Birthdays: Boxing promoter Don King is 95. Former U.S. Senator and diplomat George Mitchell is 93. Rock singer Robert Plant is 78. Country singer Rudy Gatlin is 74. Singer-songwriter John Hiatt is 74. Actor-director Peter Horton is 73. Actor Joan Allen is 70. Movie director David O. Russell is 68. Rapper KRS-One (Boogie Down Productions) is 61. Actor Colin Cunningham is 59. Actor Billy Gardell is 57. Rock singer Fred Durst (Limp Bizkit) is 56. Baseball Hall of Famer Todd Helton is 53. Actor Amy Adams is 52. Actor Misha Collins (TV: “Supernatural”) is 52. Actor Ben Barnes is 45. Actor Andrew Garfield is 43. Actor-singer Demi Lovato is 34. Actor Fátima Ptacek is 26.
