Holidays Calendar for January 20, 2024
January 20 is Martyr's Day in Azerbaijan. This day commemorates the events of Black January (also called Black Saturday), that took place in 1990 in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan.
January 20 is Armed Forces Day in Mali. Malian army was founded on October 10, 1960, and it plays a very important role in keeping peace in the Republic of Mali.
January 20 is Heroes' Day in Cape Verde and Guinea-Bissau. This is a public holiday that commemorates the assassination of Amílcar Cabral in 1973.
Timkat (also spelled Timquat) is the celebration of Epiphany in Ethiopia and Eritrea. It falls on January 19 in regular years and on January 20 in leap years, corresponding to the 10th day of the month of Terr in the Ethiopian calendar.
International Day of Acceptance is celebrated annually on January 20. It was created to promote social acceptance of disability and to show people with disabilities that they are accepted, supported, and loved.
National Disc Jockey Day, also known as National DJ Day, is observed annually on January 20. It celebrates all DJs across the nation and pays tribute to Alan “Moondog” Freed, an influential American disc jockey of the 1950s.
Penguin Awareness Day is an annual informal observance created to celebrate one of the most unusual birds in the world. It is celebrated on January 20.
January 20 is Commemoration Day of Defenders of the Barricades in Latvia. This day commemorates the events that took place in January 1991 in Riga.
The Day of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea is a Ukrainian observance held every January 20. It was created to commemorate the 1991 Crimean sovereignty referendum that resulted in the re-establishment of the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic.
Anniversaries and Memorial Days →
Ukraine
Day of Remembrance of the Defenders of the Donetsk Airport in Ukraine
The Day of Remembrance of the Defenders of the Donetsk Airport, also known informally as Cyborg Remembrance Day, is a Ukrainian memorial day observed annually on January 20. It is dedicated to everyone who defended the Donetsk airport from Russia-backed separatists from May 26, 2014 to January 22, 2015.
National Cheese Lovers Day is an unofficial food day that originated in the United States. It is observed on January 20 by everyone who loves cheese, that is to say by millions of people not just in the US, but all over the world.
Taking breaks during work is essential to your productivity and mental health. National Coffee Break Day is celebrated annually on January 20 to raise awareness of the importance of taking short breaks to reduce stress, boost efficiency, and build good work relationships.
National Buttercrunch Day is celebrated annually on January 20. It was created to honor a delicious toffee candy topped with chocolate and nuts.
If you haven’t used the gift cards that you got for Christmas and New Year’s yet, the third Saturday of January is the perfect day to finally do it because it is National Use Your Gift Card Day. It was created to ensure that people make the most out of their gift cards.
January 20 is a drum festival of Tamborrada, that is held in San Sebastián, Spain. This festival lasts for 24 hours and its participants dressed as cooks and soldiers march across the city.
Festivals on January 20, 2024
- International Hot Air Balloon Festival of Château-d’Oex in Château-d’Oex, Switzerland
- Carnival of Ovar in Ovar, Portugal
- Dhaka International Film Festival in Dhaka, Bangladesh
- Montreal International Auto Show in Montreal, Canada
- Berlin International Green Week in Berlin, Germany
- Slamdance Film Festival in Park City, USA
- Washington Auto Show in Washington, USA
- Fringe World in Perth, Australia
- Sundance Film Festival in Park CIty, USA
- Celtic Connections in Glasgow, United Kingdom
- Havasu Balloon Festival and Fair in Lake Havasu City, USA
- International Kolkata Book Fair in Kolkata, India
- M1 Singapore Fringe Festival in Singapore, Singapore
- Manfredonia Carnival in Manfredonia, Italy
- Massafra Carnival in Massafra, Italy
This Day in History
- 2022 Died: Meat Loaf (stage name of Michael Lee Aday), American singer and actor known for his powerful, wide-ranging voice and theatrical live shows.
- 2021 Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th US President, becoming the oldest person ever inaugurated. Kamala Harris became the first female Vice President of the United States.
- 2011 The government of Joseph Estrada, the thirteenth President of the Philippines, was peacefully overthrown as a result of the 2001 EDSA Revolution.
- 2010 Died: Etta James (born Jamesetta Hawkins), American singer-songwriter, the winner of 17 Blues Music Awards and 6 Grammys. She was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
- 1996 Died: Gerry Mulligan, American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, arranger, and composer. He is considered one of the leading baritone saxophonists in the history of jazz.
- 1994 Died: Matt Busby, Scottish football player and manager best known for managing Manchester United between 1945 and 1969 and again for the second half of the 1970–71 season.
- 1993 Died: Audrey Hepburn (born Audrey Kathleen Ruston), British actress and humanitarian. The American Film Institute ranked her as the third greatest female screen legend in the history of American cinema.
- 1992 Air Inter Flight 148, Airbus A320-111, crashed in the Vosges Mountains while circling to land at Strasbourg Airport. Of 96 people on board, 87 people died (82 passengers, 5 crew members).
- 1990 Died: Barbara Stanwyck (born Ruby Catherine Stevens), American actress whose film and television career lasted about six decades.
- 1987 Terry Waite, an envoy for the Church of England, was taken hostage in Lebanon. He remained in captivity for 1,763 days spending the first four years in solitary confinement.
- 1987 Born: Evan Peters, American actor known for his multiple roles on the TV series American Horror Story and his role as Quicksilver in the film X-Men: Days of Future Past.
- 1984 Died: Johnny Weissmuller (born Peter Johann Weißmüller), Austro-Hungarian-American competition swimmer and actor. He is famous for playing the role of Tarzan.
- 1981 The Iran hostage crisis ended. Fifty-two American diplomats and citizens who had been held hostage for 444 days were finally released.
- 1978 Born: Omar Sy, French actor known for his role in the 2011 film The Intouchables and for playing the main character in the Netflix television series Lupin.
- 1971 Born: Gary Barlow, English pianist, composer, singer-songwriter, and record producer. He is best known as lead vocalist and frontman of the pop group Take That.
- 1959 The first flight of the Vickers Vanguard occurred. The Vickers Vanguard was a British short/medium-range turboprop airliner that retired in 1996.
- 1957 Born: Andy Sheppard, British jazz saxophonist and composer. He is known for his collaboration with many notable figures in contemporary jazz.
- 1946 Born: David Lynch, American film and television director, screenwriter, producer, author, musician, and painter. He is known for the highly popular murder mystery series Twin Peaks.
- 1945 Germany started to evacuate the German civilian population and military personnel from East Prussia and the Klaipėda region. The evacuation of over 1.8 million people took nearly two months.
- 1942 The Wannsee Conference was held in Berlin. During this meeting senior officials of Nazi Germany agreed to implement the so-called final solution to the Jewish question.
- 1936 Edward VIII became King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire, and Emperor of India. He abdicated on December 11, 1936.
- 1936 Died: George V, King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India. His reign lasted almost 26 years from 1910 till 1936.
- 1934 Born: Tom Baker (full name Thomas Stewart Baker), English actor best known for his role as the Fourth Doctor in the cult sci-fi television series Doctor Who.
- 1931 Born: David Lee, American physicist. He was awarded the 1966 Nobel Prize in Physics, sharing it with Robert C. Richardson and Douglas Osheroff.
- 1921 The first constitution of the modern Turkish state was ratified by the Grand National Assembly of Turkey. It consisted of only twenty-three short articles.
- 1920 Born: Federico Fellini, outstanding Italian film director and screenwriter. He won five Academy Awards including the most Oscars in history for Best Foreign Language Film.
- 1920 Born: DeForest Kelley, American actor, screenwriter, singer and poet. He is best known for his role as Leonard "Bones" McCoy in the television series Star Trek and subsequent movies.
- 1900 Died: John Ruskin, English art critic, art patron, draughtsman, philanthropist, social thinker, and watercolorist. He had a strong influence on the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
- 1875 Died: Jean-François Millet, French painter noted for his scenes of peasant farmers. He was one of the founders of the Barbizon school.
- 1873 Born: Johannes V. Jensen, Danish writer awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1944. He is often considered to be the first great Danish author of the 20th century.
- 1775 Born: André-Marie Ampère, French physicist and mathematician, one of the main founders of the science of classical electromagnetism.The SI unit of measurement of electric current is named after him.
- 1666 Died: Anne of Austria, queen consort of France and Navarre, wife of King Louis XIII. She was regent for her son, Louis XIV of France, from 1640 till 1651.
- 1265 De Montfort's Parliament first met at Westminster Hall, London, England. It was dissolved and repudiated on February 15, 1265 by King Henry III.