On October 20,1962, President Kennedy returns to Washington from the World's Fair in Seattle with an "upper respiratory infection." That's the announced reason for his missing a scheduled press conference that day. In fact, he's in a top secret meeting with advisors, trying to choose the best response to news that Soviet nuclear missiles have been spotted in Cuba. He will decide on a blockade of the island nation, to go into effect the following day. On October 20, 1774, the First Continental Congress creates the Continental Association, which calls for a complete ban on all trade between America and Great Britain of all goods, wares or merchandise. The CA is a response to the Coercive Acts - or “Intolerable Acts” as they were known to the colonists – which were established by the British government to restore order in Massachusetts following the Boston Tea Party. The Continental Association is one of the first acts of Congress behind which every colony firmly stood. On October 20, 1968, 21-year-old Oregonian Dick Fosbury wins gold with an Olympic record-7 feet 4 1/4 inch high jump at the Mexico City Games. It was the first American victory in the event since 1956. Fosbury's win revolutionizes the event, as it is the international debut of his unique jumping style, “Fosbury Flop.” Previously, all high jumpers had thrown themselves face-first over the bar, straddling it with their legs as they cleared it. Fosbury discovered in high school that, while he was terrible at the conventional jumping method, he could leap much higher by twisting in mid-air, having his back to the bar as he went over. Although it looked dangerous - U.S. Track and Field Coach Pat Johnson predicted a generation of Americans would break their necks trying it - the Flop will make the old technique obsolete within a decade.
On October 21, 1854, Florence Nightingale heads off for war. Born into wealth and exceptionally well-educated for a woman of her time, Nightingale decided early in adulthood to pursue a career in nursing, over her family's objections. She had been superintendent of a London health care facility for women a little over a year when she left to join British troops fighting against the Ottoman Empire in the Crimean peninsula, bringing with her a staff of 38 volunteer nurses and 15 Catholic nuns. Her efforts during the war, and in establishing a school for nurses in London afterward, would revolutionize the nursing profession world-wide. In addition to her contributions in the medical field, she is considered a pioneer for the general acceptance of women in the workplace.
