St Paul's Cathedral

October 20: Shemini Atzeret begins at sunset (Judaism, 2008); Birth of the Báb, a holy day in the Bahá'í Faith


1708 – Having burned down in the 1666 Great Fire of London, the rebuilt St Paul's Cathedral (pictured) was completed on the 76th birthday of its architect, Christopher Wren.
1818 – The United Kingdom and the United States signed the Treaty of 1818, which settled the Canada – United States border on the 49th parallel for most of its length.
1827 – An allied British, French, and Russian naval force destroyed a combined Turkish and Egyptian fleet at the Battle of Navarino, a decisive moment in the Greek War of Independence.
1967 – Roger Patterson and Robert Gimlin filmed an unidentified subject at Six Rivers National Forest in California who they claimed was a bigfoot.
1973 – Queen Elizabeth II, in her capacity as Queen of Australia, formally opened the Sydney Opera House on Bennelong Point in Sydney Harbour.

Royal Spoonbill

The Royal or Black-billed Spoonbill (Platalea regia) is a spoonbill found in intertidal flats and shallows of fresh and saltwater wetlands in Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and the Solomon Islands. The specimen shown here is in breeding plumage, with long white plumes growing from the back of its head and coloured patches on the face