THIS DAY IN HISTORY: JANUARY 20, 1981

The Iran hostage crisis comes to an end with the release of 52 American captives who had been held for 444 days at the U. S. embassy in Tehran. They were seized on Nov. 4, 1979, by a mob of Iranian university students and supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini. The students were outraged the U. S. government, led by President Jimmy Carter, had allowed the deposed shah of Iran to travel to the U. S. to receive cancer treatments. The ayatollah refused to release all but 14 of the hostages, despite a UN order. The U. S. responded by freezing billions of dollars in Iranian assets, imposing an embargo on Iranian oil and, in April 1980, an unsuccessful rescue mission. After the shah’s death in the fall of 1980, negotiations began for the release of the hostages, with a deal reached on Jan. 19. The hostages were not freed until Jan. 20, after Ronald Reagan was sworn in as president.