28th July, on this day

1540 King Henry VIII of England marries Catherine Howard - wife number five
1586 The first potatoes arrive in Britain - brought by explorer Sir Thomas Harriot from Colombia
1588 Spanish Armada sails to overthrow England's Queen Elizabeth I
1609 Bermuda is first settled, by Admiral George Somers and other survivors of the English Sea Venture, en route to Virginia. This incident is widely thought to have been the inspiration for Shakespeare's The Tempest
1794 French Revolutionary politician Maximilien de Robespierre is executed in Paris
1809 Peninsular War: Battle of Talavera - Sir Arthur Wellesley's British, Portuguese and Spanish army defeats a French force under Joseph Bonaparte.
1821 José de San Martín on behalf of Peru declares independence from Spain
1830 Revolution in France replaces Charles X with Louis Philippe
1833 Britain passes the Emancipation Act - abolishing slavery throughout the British Empire
1851 Total solar eclipse captured on a daguerreotype photograph
1858 First recorded use of fingerprints as a means of identification by William Herschel
1862 Confederate forces defeated at More's Hill, Mo
1864 Atlanta Campaign-Battle of Ezra Church
1865 A crowd of 100,000 watches the last public execution in Scotland when Dr Edward Pritchard is hanged for poisoning his wife and mother-in-law
1866 Metric system becomes a legal measurement system in US
1882 The opera "Parsifal" is produced (Bayreuth)
1883 Shocks triggered by the volcano Epomeo (Isle of Ischia, Italy)
destroyed 1,200 houses at Casamicciola killing 2,000
1896 US City of Miami incorporated
1900 Hamburger created by Louis Lassing in Connecticut
1904 Assassination of Russian Minister of the Interior Vyacheslav Plehve
1907 Fire destroys hundreds of buildings in the seaside resort of Coney Island New York
1914 First World War starts: Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia after it failed to meet the conditions of an ultimatum it set on July 23 following the killing of Archduke Francis Ferdinand by a Serbian assassin. This event leads to the outbreak of the war.
1914 Foxtrot 1st danced at New Amsterdam Roof Garden (NYC, by Harry Fox)
1915 10,000 blacks march on 5th Ave (NYC) protesting lynchings
1915 US forces invade Haiti, stays until 1924
1917 World War I: Formation of the British Army Tank Corps
1928 Olympics open at Amsterdam
1932 President Hoover evicts "bonus" marchers from their encampment
1933 1st singing telegram delivered (to Rudy Vallee), NYC
1942 Nazis liquidate 10,000 Jews in Minsk, Russia
1942 World War II: USSR leader Joseph Stalin issues Order No. 227 in response to alarming German advances into Russia. Under the order all those who retreat or otherwise leave their positions without orders to do so will be immediately killed.
1943 Italian Facist dictator Benito Mussolini resigns
1943 President FDR announces end of coffee rationing in US
1945 US Army bomber crashes into 79th floor of Empire State Bldg, 14 die
1948 I.G. Farben chemical plant explodes in Ludwigshafen, Germany, 182 die
1951 Walt Disney's "Alice In Wonderland" released but premiered in London on 26th July
1957 Heavy rain and mudslide occur at Isahaya, western Kyushu, Japan, 992 killed.
1958 Lord Jellicoe makes his maiden speech in the House of Lords.
1960 Republican National convention selects Richard Nixon
1962 19 die in a train crash in Steelton. Pa
1962 Mariner I launched to Mars falls into Atlantic Ocean
1964 Ranger 7 launched toward the Moon; sent back 4308 TV pictures
1965 In Britain, Edward Heath becomes leader of the Conservative Party
1965 Vietnam War: US President Lyndon B. Johnson announces his order to increase the number of United States troops in South Vietnam from 75,000 to 125,000
1973 Summer Jam at Watkins Glen: 600,000 people attend what was for many years the largest musical concert in history, at the Watkins Glen Grand Prix Raceway.
1973 Skylab 3's astronauts (Bean, Garriott and Lousma) launched
1974 69 die when packed bus strikes heavy truck (Belem, Brazil)
1976 242,000 die in Tientsin-Tangshan (China) 8.2 earthquake
1976 Eldon Joersz amd Geo Morgan set world air speed record of 3,530 kph
1977 1st oil flow through the Alaska pipeline
1977 Cricketer Ian Botham makes his Test debut for England
1984 23rd modern Olympic games opens in Los Angeles
1986 NASA releases transcript from doomed Challenger, pilot Michael Smith
could be heard saying, "Uh-oh!" as spacecraft disintegrated
1988 Israeli diplomats arrive in Moscow for 1st visit in 21 years
1988 Jordan cancels $1.3 billion development plan in West Bank
1988 Winnie Mandella's home in Soweto, South Africa destroyed by arson
1996 Kennewick Man, the remains of a prehistoric man, was discovered near Kennewick, Washington. .
2002 Nine coal miners trapped in the flooded Quecreek Mine in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, were rescued after 77 hours underground.
2005 The Provisional Irish Republican Army (The PIRA) call an end to their thirty year long armed campaign in Northern Ireland.
2005
A tornado touches down in a residential area in south Birmingham, England, causing £4,000,000 worth of damages and injuring 39 people.

28th July 2006

US 'outrage' over Israeli claims

UN body criticises US on rights

Deaths mount amid California heat

28th July 2007

Libya details medic release deal

Liberia lifts diamond ban

Japan election campaign ends

28th July 2008

Iraq suicide blasts cause carnage

Al-Qaeda chemical expert 'killed'

India, Pakistan in Kashmir clash

28th July 2009

Dozens lost as Haiti boat sinks

Baghdad bank robbers kill eight

Nigeria begins assault on rebels

28th July 2010

No survivors as Pakistan plane crash kills 152

Afghanistan bus blast 'kills 25'

Iraq helicopter crash kills 5

Birthdates which occurred on 28th July :

1165 Ibn al-'Arabi Muslim mystic/philosopher
1746 Thomas Heyward soldier, signed Decl of Ind
1750 Philippe Fabre d'glantine France, poet/satirist/politician
1844 Gerard Manley Hopkins England, poet (The Windhover)
1859 Balington Booth founded Volunteers of America
1866 Beatrix Potter England, children's author (Tale of Peter Rabbit)
1874 Ernst Cassirer Germany, philosopher/educator (Essay on Man)
1887 Marcel Duchamp painter (Nude Descending a Staircase)
1892 Joe E Brown Holgate Ohio, comedian (Buck Circus Hour)
19-- Brianne Leary Providence RI, actress (CHiPs, Baa Baa Black Sheep)
19-- France Lee McCain York Pa, actress (Apple's Way, 13 Queens Blvd)
19-- Gregg Giuffria rocker (House of Lords-Sahara)
19-- Scott Bloom actor (The Stuff)
1901 Rudy Vallee Vt, singer (Vagabond Dreams, My Time Is Your Time)
1907 Earl S Tupper invented Tupperware
1907 Vivian Vance Cherryvale Ks, actress (Ethel Mertz-I Love Lucy)
1909 Malcolm Lowry novelist (Under the Volcano)
1910 Bill Goodwin SF Calif, announcer (Burns & Allen, Boing Boing Show)
1911 Ann Doran Amarillo Tx, actress (Longstreet, Shirley)
1911 Gerhard Stoeck Germany, javelin thrower (Olympic-gold-1936)
1912 Eleazar de Carvalho Iguat£, Brazil, conductor/tuba (Tiradentes)
1916 David Brown NYC, director (Jaws, Planet of the Apes)
1916 Laird Cregar Phila, actor (Charley's Aunt, Hangover Square)
1922 Jacques Piccard Switzerland, undersea explorer (bathyscaph Trieste)
1929 Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis 1st lady (1961-63)
1930 Darryl Hickman Hollywood Cal, actor (Human Comedy, Tea & Sympathy)
1934 Jacques D'Amboise dancer/educator (NYC Ballet Company)
1937 Peter Duchin NYC, pianist/bandleader (Peter Duchin Orch)
1938 Robert Hughes [Studley Forrest], Australia, writer/critic
1940 Phil Proctor comedian (Firesign Theater)
1941 Riccardo Muti Napoli Italy, conductor (Philadelphia Orch)
1943 Bill Bradley Crystal City Mo, NY Knick/(Sen-D-NJ)/Rhodes scholar
1943 Lawrence Elkins football player FL (Houston Oilers)
1943 Mike Bloomfield blues musician (Analine)
1944 Daniel Morelon France, 1K speed skater (Olympic-gold-1968, 72)
1945 Jim Davis cartoonist (Garfield)
1945 Richard Wright rocker (Pink Floyd-The Wall)
1946 Linda Kelsey Minneapolis, actress (Billie-Lou Grant, Kate-Day by Day)
1947 Barbara Ferrell US, 400m relay racer (Olympic-gold-1968)
1947 Elena Novikova-Belova USSR, foils (Olympic-gold-1968)
1947 Sally Struther Portland Oregon, actress (Gloria-All in the Family)
1948 Georgia Engel Wash DC, actress (Georgette-Mary Tyler Moore Show)
1949 Marilyn Quayle wife of vice president Dan Quayle
1949 Vida Blue major-league pitcher (Cy Young & AL MVP 1971)
1958 Terry Fox ran "Marathon of Hope" across Canada
1961 Scott E Parazynski Little Rock Ark, MD/astronaut
1967 Lori Loughlin NY, actress (Edge of Night, New Kids, Secret Admirer)

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Deaths which occurred on July 28th:
1540 Thomas Cromwell King Henry VIII's chief minister, executed
1655 Cyrano de Bergerac French dramatist/novelist, dies in Paris
1746 John Peter Zenger journalist, involved in 1st admendment fight, dies
1750 Johann Sebastian Bach German composer (Art of the Fugue), dies at 65
1794 Maximilien Robespierre Fr revolutionary/avocat (1781), guillotined
1794 Robespierre & 22 other terrorists executed to thunderous cheers
1937 Joseph Lee father of Playgrounds movement, dies
1971 Diane Arbus photographer, commits suicide at 48
1974 Truman Bradley host (Science Fiction Theater), dies at 69
1984 Bess Flowers actress, dies at 85
1985 Grant Williams actor, dies of toxic poisoning at 54
1987 James Burnham philosopher (Coming Defeat of Communism), dies at 81