TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON: July 28
1540 Henry VIII of England marries Catherine Howard; Thomas Cromwell is beheaded on Tower Hill in England.
1586 Sir Thomas Harriot introduces potatoes to Europe
1794 French Revolutionary figure Maximilien Robespierre and 22 other leaders of “the Terror” guillotined to thunderous cheers in Paris
1821 Peru declares independence
1835 King Louis-Philippe of France survives an assassination attempt.
1866 Metric system becomes a legal measurement system in US
1868 The 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which established the citizenship of African Americans and guaranteed due process of law, was ratified.
1898 Spain, through the offices of the French embassy in Washington, D.C., requests peace terms in its war with the United States.
1914 Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia, beginning World War I.
1915 US forces invade Haiti, stays until 1924
1917 Silent Parade organised by James Weldon Johnson of 10,000 African-Americans who march on 5th Ave in NYC to protest against lynching
1920 Pancho Villa surrenders to the Mexican government.
1932 The Bonus Army of impoverished World War I veterans is violently pushed out of Washington, D.C.
1943 Pres FDR announces end of coffee rationing in US
1945 A B-25 bomber crashes into the Empire State Building in New York City, killing 13 people.
1951 Walt Disney’s “Alice In Wonderland” released
1958 National Aeronautics and Space Act is passed by the US Congress
1977 1st oil flow through the Alaska pipeline
1982 San Francisco, CA, became the first city in the U.S. to ban handguns.
1988 Israeli diplomats arrive in Moscow for the first time in 21 years
1990 A fire at an electrical substation causes a blackout in Chicago. Some 40,000 people were without power for up to three days.
1996 Discovery of remains of a prehistoric man near Kennewick, Washington, casts doubts on accepted beliefs of when, how and where the Americas were populated.
1998 Monica Lewinsky received blanket immunity from prosecution to testify before a grand jury about her relationship with U.S. President Clinton.
2002 Nine Pennsylvania coal miners were rescued after 77 hours of being trapped in a mine shaft.
2005 The Irish Republican Army (IRA) announces an end to its 30-year armed campaign in Northern Ireland.
2006 Researchers announced that two ancient reptiles had been found off Australia. The Umoonasaurus and Opallionectes were the first of their kind to be found in the period soon after the Jurassic era.
REFERENCE: HISTORY.NET, ONTHISDAY.COM, TIMEANDDATE.COM, INFOPLEASE.COM, FACTMONSTER.COM, SCOPESYS.COM, ON-THIS-DAY.COM, THEPEOPLEHISTORY.COM
