Today in History: October 20. There is a lot going on today. Richard Nixon figures in a couple stories, and there are two stories involving rock bands. In 1944, General Douglas MacArthur returned to the Philippines during the Battle of Leyte in World War II, fulfilling a promise he made after being ordered to evacuate the country two years prior. In 1803, the U.S. Senate ratified the Louisiana Purchase. In 1947, the House Un-American Activities Committee opened hearings into alleged Communist influence and infiltration in the U.S. motion picture industry. In 1967 a jury in Meridian, Mississippi convicted seven men of violating the civil rights of three slain civil rights workers. In 1973, in the “Saturday Night Massacre,” special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox was dismissed and the attorney general and the deputy attorney general resigned. In 1973, the Sydney Opera House was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II. In 1976, 78 people were killed when the Norwegian tanker SS Frosta rammed the commuter ferry George Prince on the Mississippi River. In 1977, three members of the rock group Lynyrd Skynyrd were killed in the crash of a chartered plane near McComb, Mississippi. In 1990 three members of the rap group 2 Live Crew were acquitted by a jury in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, of violating obscenity laws with an adults-only concert. In 2011, Moammar Gadhafi, 69, Libya’s dictator for 42 years, was killed as revolutionary fighters overwhelmed his hometown of Sirte. Through history it seems October 20 has become a day of turmoil.