On Jan. 20, 1981, as Reagan was giving his inaugural speech, <em>IRAN</em> released 66 Americans hostages who were in that condition for 444 days and were placed on a plane in Tehran. Reagan announced their release later in the afternoon at a Congressional luncheon. The Iran Hostage Crisis began on Nov. 4, 1979, when a group of abundant hundred militant Islamic students broke into the United States embassy in Tehran and took its tenants hostage.