At A Glance

20 February 1979 at a glance

Day of the week
20 February 1979 was a Tuesday.
Billboard Hot 100 No. 1
The Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 was “Da Ya Think I'm Sexy?” by Rod Stewart.
Top Film of 1979
The highest-grossing film worldwide released in 1979 was Moonraker.
Bestselling Novel of 1979
“The Matarese Circle” by Robert Ludlum was No. 1 on Publishers Weekly's US fiction list for 1979.
Top-Rated TV Show
“60 Minutes” (CBS) was No. 1 in the Nielsen ratings for the 1979–80 season.
Star sign
The star sign for 20 February is Pisces.
Chinese zodiac
In the Chinese zodiac, 20 February 1979 fell in the Year of the Goat.
Birthstone
The birthstone for February is Amethyst.
Moon phase
The moon phase on 20 February 1979 was Waning Crescent.

On this day: 20 February

  • 1968 The China Academy of Space Technology, China's main arm for the research, development, and creation of space satellites, is established in Beijing.
  • 1971 The United States Emergency Broadcast System is accidentally activated in an erroneous national alert.
  • 1986 The Soviet Union launches its Mir spacecraft. Remaining in orbit for 15 years, it is occupied for ten of those years.
  • 1988 The Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast votes to secede from Azerbaijan and join Armenia, triggering the First Nagorno-Karabakh War.
  • 1991 In the Albanian capital Tirana, a gigantic statue of Albania's long-time leader, Enver Hoxha, is brought down by mobs of angry protesters.

Famous people born on February 20

  • Justin Verlander, American baseball player (born 1983)
  • Olivia Rodrigo, American actress and singer (born 2003)
  • Kurt Cobain, American musician (1967–1994)
  • Rihanna, Barbadian singer, songwriter, businesswoman, and actress (born 1988)

Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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Events of 1979 in the United States

A selection from Wikipedia's '1979 in the United States'. Not a complete list.

  • February 20 – This Old House premieres on PBS.
  • March 29 – America's most serious nuclear power plant accident at Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania.
  • April 1 – Nickelodeon debuts on cable television, playing children's television shows 24 hours a day. Pinwheel, which first premiered on the channel C-3 in 1977, was one of the first shows to be broadcast on the channel.

Life in the US in 1979

President

Jimmy Carter

Gas (per gallon)

$0.86

Loaf of Bread

$0.43

Average House

$62,900

Weekly Wage

$250

Or

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Famous Faces Born in the 1970s

Well-known people born in the same decade as you, not on your birthday.

Sources: Wikidata and Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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