At A Glance

20 January 1987 at a glance

Day of the week
20 January 1987 was a Tuesday.
Billboard Hot 100 No. 1
The Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 was “Shake You Down” by Gregory Abbott.
Top Film of 1987
The highest-grossing film worldwide released in 1987 was Fatal Attraction.
Bestselling Novel of 1987
“The Tommyknockers” by Stephen King was No. 1 on Publishers Weekly's US fiction list for 1987.
Top-Rated TV Show
“The Cosby Show” (NBC) was No. 1 in the Nielsen ratings for the 1987–88 season.
Star sign
The star sign for 20 January is Aquarius.
Chinese zodiac
In the Chinese zodiac, 20 January 1987 fell in the Year of the Tiger.
Birthstone
The birthstone for January is Garnet.
Moon phase
The moon phase on 20 January 1987 was Waning Gibbous.

On this day: 20 January

  • 1974 China gains control over all the Paracel Islands after a military engagement between the naval forces of China and South Vietnam.
  • 1986 In the United States, Martin Luther King Jr. Day is celebrated as a federal holiday for the first time.
  • 1986 Leabua Jonathan, Prime Minister of Lesotho, is ousted from power in a coup d'état led by General Justin Lekhanya.
  • 1990 Protests in Azerbaijan, part of the Dissolution of the Soviet Union.
  • 1991 Sudan's government imposes Islamic law nationwide, worsening the civil war between the country's Muslim north and Christian south.

Famous people born on January 20

  • J. J. McCarthy, American football player (born 2003)
  • David Lynch, American director, producer, and screenwriter (1946–2025)
  • Evan Peters, American actor (born 1987)
  • Sid Wilson, American musician (born 1977)

Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Choose your country: the charts, news and leaders change to match.

Events of 1987 in the United States

A selection from Wikipedia's '1987 in the United States'. Not a complete list.

  • March 3 – Ruthless Records was founded by Eazy-E & Jerry Heller.
  • March 30 – The 59th Academy Awards, hosted by Chevy Chase, Goldie Hawn and Paul Hogan, are held at Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles. Oliver Stone's Platoon wins four awards out of eight nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director.
  • April 19 – The Simpsons cartoon first appears as a series of shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show.
More events of 1987 →Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Life in the US in 1987

President

Ronald Reagan

Gas (per gallon)

$0.90

Loaf of Bread

$0.68

Average House

$92,000

Weekly Wage

$358

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Famous Faces Born in the 1980s

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

Hayden Panettiere21 August 1989Actress & singerView their day →Alan Ritchson28 November 1982ActorView their day →Anne Hathaway12 November 1982ActressView their day →Dakota Johnson4 October 1989Actress & modelView their day →Macklemore19 June 1983RapperView their day →Andrew Garfield20 August 1983ActorView their day →Julia Stiles28 March 1981ActressView their day →Taylor Swift13 December 1989Singer-songwriterView their day →

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

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