Major Mike | Today in History 09/20 (Battle of the Sexes)

Billie Jean King shakes hands with retired tennis champion Bobby Riggs after defeating him in a 'Battle of the Sexes' match (© Bettmann/Corbis)

(1973) No love lost in tennis battle of the sexes

Having bested Margaret Court months earlier, former Wimbledon champ Bobby Riggs, 55, meets women’s tennis superstar Billie Jean King, 29, in what the media dub “the battle of the sexes.” Riggs’ dream of proving male athletic superiority is smashed when King handily wins the match in front of spectators and millions of TV viewers.

In tennis, “Battle of the Sexes” is a term that has been used to describe various exhibition matches played between a man and a woman. Most famously, the term is used for a nationally televised match in 1973, held at the Houston Astrodome, between 55-year-old Bobby Riggs and 29-year-old Billie Jean King, which King won in three sets. The match attracted massive attention and was viewed by an estimated 90 million people around the world; King’s win is considered a milestone in public acceptance of women’s tennis.

First occurred: May 13, 1973

Paraphernalia from the Billie Jean King vs Bobby Riggs match
wiki/Battle_of_the_Sexes_(tennis)

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(1973) No love lost in tennis battle of the sexes.
Also on this day,

1746 | Bonnie Prince Charlie escapes Scotland after failed uprising

As the second Jacobite claimant to Britain’s throne, Charles Edward Stuart has spent a year in Scotland struggling to do what his father, ‘The Old Pretender,’ could not. This ‘Young Pretender’ has no better luck, and breaks for France as the dream of a Catholic British king dies out.

1873 | Panic on Wall Street as bonds and banks fail as a depression looms

Wall Street is in free fall in the wake of US railroad bonds defaulting and the biggest banks in the US failing, and the crisis will close the New York Stock Exchange for 10 days. A major worldwide economic collapse follows and will not let up in some countries for two decades.

1946 | 1st Cannes opens to glamour, commerce, and art converging

Scheduled to hold an inaugural gala in 1939, Cannes had to delay its film festival’s rollout for seven years while WWII raged. Now that the all-clear has sounded, the Cannes Film Festival begins its annual tradition as the film world descends on the French Riviera resort.

Today in History ^09/20/17

Illustration of officials closing the doors of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) during the panic of 1873 (© Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

(1873) Bonds and banks fail as a depression looms

Wall Street is in free fall in the wake of US railroad bonds defaulting and the biggest banks in the US failing, and the crisis will close the New York Stock Exchange for 10 days. A major worldwide economic collapse follows and will not let up in some countries for two decades.

The Panic of 1873 was a financial crisis that triggered a depression in Europe and North America that lasted from 1873 until 1879, and even longer in some countries. In Britain, for example, it started two decades of stagnation known as the "Long Depression" that weakened the country's economic leadership. The Panic was known as the "Great Depression" until the events in the early 1930s set a new standard.

Start date: 1873
End date: 1879

A bank run on the Fourth National Bank No. 20 Nassau Street, New York City, from Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, 4 October 1873