NOW & THEN
20 MAY
1498: Vasco da Gama arrived at Calicut, southern India, after discovering a route via the tip of southern Africa.
1588: The Spanish Armada set sail from Lisbon on a mission to invade England. It comprised 129 ships sent by Phillip II of Spain.
1840: York Minster was badly damaged by fire.
1862: Abraham Lincoln, the United States president, signed the Homestead Act into law.
1873: Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis received a United States patent for blue jeans with copper rivets.
1883: Krakatoa began to erupt. The volcano’s final and most notable explosion occurred on 26 August.
1902: Cuba gained independence from the United States. Tomás Estrada Palma became the first president of Cuba.
1932: Amelia Earhart became the first woman to make a solo air crossing of the Atlantic.
1940: The first prisoners arrived at a new concentration camp at Auschwitz.
1941: Germany began an aerial invasion of Crete.
1956: The Americans dropped their first hydrogen bomb over Bikini atoll in the Marshall Islands of the Pacific.
1965: PIA Flight 705, a Pakistan International Airlines Boeing 720-040 B, crashed while descending to land at Cairo International Airport, killing 119 of the 125 passengers and crew.
1969: The Battle of Hamburger Hill in Vietnam ended.
1983: First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes Aids in the journal Science by Luc Montagnier and Robert Gallo individually.
1990: An Israeli gunman killed seven Arab workers, setting off serious riots in the occupied territories in which seven more Arabs died as Israeli troops were called in.
1991: The USSR passed a law allowing Soviet citizens to leave the country of their own free will.
1993: The House of Commons gave the Maastricht Treaty bill its third reading. Forty-one Conservative MPS voted against the agreement.
1994: Cluny Parish Church in Edinburgh was packed and 2,000 people stood in the streets outside for the funeral service of the Labour leader, John Smith.
2002: The independence of East Timor was recognised by Portugal, formally ending 23 years of Indonesian rule and three years of provisional United Nations administration.
2009: An Indonesian military transport plane carrying troops and their families crashed on the island of Java, killing more than 100 people.
2010: The first annual Everybody Draw Mohammed Day was held. The event caused Pakistan to shut down the social networking site Facebook in their country in protest.
2013: A tornado, which reached speeds of 210mph, swept through Moore, Oklahoma, in the United States, killing 24 people – including ten children – and injuring more than 350 others.
2014: Thailand’s army declared martial law, deploying troops, armed with machine guns, in the heart of Bangkok, in a move aimed at stabilising the country after months of unrest.
BIRTHDAYS
Lord Carloway, Lord President of the Court of Session, Lord Justice General, head of the Scottish Judiciary, 68; Lynn Davies CBE, Olympic gold medallist longjumper, 80; Greg Dyke, directorgeneral, BBC 2000-04, 75; Keith Fletcher OBE, English cricketer and coach, 78; Annabel Giles, television presenter, 63; Nigel Griffiths, former Labour MP (1987-2010), 67; Nick Heyward, British singer, 61; Tina Hobley, British actress, 51; Michèle Roberts, British novelist, 73; Earl Spencer, 58; Owen Teale, British actor, 61; Louis Theroux, British broadcaster, 52; Douglas Wyllie, Scottish rugby player, 59
ANNIVERSARIES
Births: 1895 Reginald Joseph Mitchell, Spitfire designer; 1904 Margery Allingham, crime writer, creator of Albert Campion; 1908 James Stewart, actor; 1920 Betty Driver MBE, British actress; 1944 Joe Cocker OBE, British singer, 70.
Deaths: 1974 Georgette Heyer, novelist; 1975 Dame Barbara Hepworth, sculptor; 1998 Wolf Mankowitz, scriptwriter; 2012 Robin Gibb CBE, British singer; 2013 Ray Manzarek, US keyboard player (The Doors); 2019 Niki Lauda, Austrian racing driver.