Today in History 1/20

1265: The English Parliament meets for the first time.
1356: Edward Balliol abdicates as King of Scotland. He reigned simultaneously with King David II and never enjoyed much support. It didn't help that he was playing footsie with the English during one of England's frequent "Let's beat on Scotland!" phases which most Scots found to be pretty irritating.
1502: The present day location of Rio de Janeiro is first explored by Portuguese explorer Gaspar de Lemos.
1649: King Charles I goes on trial for treason and other high crimes.
1783: Great Britain signs a peace treaty with France and Spain, officially ending hostilities in the Revolutionary War.
1841: Hong Kong Island is occupied by the British.
1885: L.A. Thompson patents the roller coaster.
1887: The United States Senate allows the Navy to lease Pearl Harbor.
1892: At the YMCA in Springfield, MA, the first official basketball game is played.
1896: George Burns is born.
1900: Colin Clive is born. He played Dr. Frankenstein in the original Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein.
1920: Frederico Fellini is born.
1920: DeForrest Kelley is born. He is best known for his towering performance in the giant killer rabbit epic Night of the Lepus but he also worked on some old science fiction show.
1920: The ACLU is founded.
1924: Slim Whitman is born.
1929: Arte Johnson is born.
1930: Buzz Aldrin is born. Here he is laying the smack down on a rather aggressive conspiracy theorist.
1934: Tom Baker is born. He played the fourth (and most famous) Doctor on Doctor Who. But he also played an Elven healer in the godawful Dungeons and Dragons movie.1936: Edward VIII becomes King of the United Kingdom.1937: Franklin Delano Roosevelt is inaugurated for a second term. This is the first time the inauguration had been held on January 20th - previously it had been on March 4th.
1942: At the Wannsee conference the Nazis agree on the "final solution to the Jewish problem."
1946: David Lynch is born.1950: Liza Goddard is born. She played Kari in the 1983 Doctor Who episode "Terminus" and was married briefly to the sixth Doctor Colin Baker, aka The Worst Doctor Ever.
1952: Paul Stanley is born. He was The Starchild in Kiss. Here they are on the 1976 Paul Lynde Halloween Special:
1956: Bill Maher is born.
1958: Lorenzo Lamas is born. He played the wrongly accused cop seeking his wife's murderer on Renegade. Dr. Forrester attempts to turn Mike into him in MST3K episode # 622, Angel's Revenge.
1960: Will Wright is born. He's the guy who designed SimCity and The Sims. I've lost years off my life playing SimCity but I never got too into The Sims. It's too much like my real life. "Get up, rush to work, come home, cram food down your throat, fall into bed in a dead sleep. Repeat." Some fun!
1965: Alan Freed dies.1969: The first pulsar is discovered in the Crab Nebula.
1981: Iran releases 52 hostages twenty minutes after Ronald Reagan is inaugurated.
1984: Johnny Weissmuller dies.1986: Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is celebrated as a federal holiday for the first time.
1986: The United Kingdom and France announce plans to construct the Channel Tunnel.

Today in History elements mostly cribbed from The History Channel, Wikipedia, The New York Times, The Jewish World Review, The Writer's Almanac and anything else I can dig up