October 20 Birthday

Famous Birthdays on October 20

• Christopher Wren (1632)

  English architect who designed St Paul's Cathedral and rebuilt much of London after the Great Fire of 1666.

• Arthur Rimbaud (1854)

  French poet known for his influential and radically inventive body of work, largely completed before age 21.

• Kamala Harris (1964)

  49th Vice President of the United States and former U.S. Senator from California.

• Snoop Dogg (1971)

  American rapper known for the album Doggystyle and decades of work across music and entertainment.

This Day in History

• 1944 — General Douglas MacArthur returned to the Philippines with Allied forces, fulfilling his 1942 pledge, 'I shall return,' made after he was ordered to evacuate the islands earlier in World War II.

• 1973 — U.S. President Richard Nixon fired Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox in what became known as the Saturday Night Massacre, prompting the resignations of the attorney general and deputy attorney general.

• 2011 — Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was captured and killed near his hometown of Sirte, ending his four-decade rule during the Libyan civil war.

What October 20 Says About You

General Douglas MacArthur made good on a promise on October 20, 1944, returning to the Philippines with Allied forces two years after he'd been ordered to evacuate, fulfilling the pledge 'I shall return' that he'd made to the Filipino people in a moment of retreat. It's a date that has, in its own way, kept returning to the theme of power reclaimed or forcibly ended: the Saturday Night Massacre unfolded on this date in 1973, when President Nixon fired Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox and triggered the resignations of the attorney general and his deputy in a single evening, a crisis that accelerated Nixon's own political unraveling. Nearly four decades later, on this same date in 2011, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was captured and killed near his hometown of Sirte, ending a four-decade rule that had, for most of its existence, seemed unshakeable. Christopher Wren, born on this date in 1632, spent years rebuilding London after the Great Fire of 1666 destroyed much of the old city, turning catastrophic loss into some of England's most enduring architecture, including St Paul's Cathedral — a different, more constructive kind of return from ruin than MacArthur's, but a return nonetheless. Kamala Harris, born on this date in 1964, became the first woman, first Black person, and first person of South Asian descent to serve as U.S. Vice President, a genuinely new kind of arrival rather than a return to something previously held. The 20th falls under Libra, and numerology reduces its digits to day number 2, tied to partnership, diplomacy, and balance — an interesting pairing for a date whose history includes both a fired special prosecutor and a deposed dictator, situations where diplomacy and balance had already broken down by the time the headline event occurred. Arthur Rimbaud, born on this date in 1854, packed an entire influential literary career into his teens and early twenties before abandoning poetry altogether, a different kind of dramatic exit than anything else tied to this date. Snoop Dogg, born the same day in 1971, has built one of the longest-running careers in hip-hop by repeatedly reinventing his own public persona rather than sticking to a single fixed lane. October's birthstone opal, known for showing different colors depending on the viewing angle, fits a date whose history keeps returning to questions of power seen from dramatically different perspectives depending on who's telling the story. October's flowers, marigold and cosmos, stake no direct claim on any of this history, though the marigold's long association with remembrance suits a date whose biggest headlines involve both promises kept and rules finally broken.