1928

1928 (MCMXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar).

Events

January-May

• January 6-7 - River Thames floods in London - 14 drowned
• January 7 - Moat at the Tower of London, previously drained in 1843, is completely refilled by a tidal wave
• January 12 - US murderer Ruth Snyder executed at Ossining
• January 17 - OGPU arrests Lev Trotsky in Moscow; he assumes a status of passive resistance and is exiled to Turkestan
• February - Kurume University (Japan) established
• February 11 - II Olympic Winter Games open in St. Moritz, Switzerland
• February 12 - Heavy hails kill 11 in England
• February 20 - Swung parliament produced in Japan after the general election.
• February 25 - Charles Jenkins Laboratories of Washington, DC becomes the first holder of a television license from the Federal Radio Commission.
• March 12 - Malta becomes a British dominion
• March 12 - In California, the St. Francis Dam north of Los Angeles fails killing 400
• March 21 - Charles Lindbergh is presented the Medal of Honor for his first trans-Atlantic flight.
• March 26 - China Academy of Art founded in Hangzhou in Republic of China,first named National Academy of Art
• April 10 - Pineapple Primary - Republican Party primary elections in Chicago preceded by assassinations and bombings
• April 12 - Bomb attack against the Dictator of Italy in Milan - 17 bystanders dead
• April 22 - Earthquake destroys Corinth - 200.000 buildings destroyed
• May 15 - Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia, commenced operations
• May 15 - Release of the animated short Plane Crazy, featuring the first appearances of Mickey and Minnie Mouse.
• May 23 - Bomb attack against Italian consulate in Buenos Aires - 22 dead, 41 injured
• May 24 - Airship Italia crashes on the North Pole; one of the occupants is Italian general Umberto Nobile
• May 30 - A rescue expedition leaves for the North Pole

June-August

• June 8 - By seizing Beijing and renaming it Běipíng, the NRA puts an end to the Fengtian warlords' Běiyáng government there.
• June 11 - Medical doctor's strike begins in Vienna
• June 14 - Students take over the medical wing of Rosario University in Argentina
• June 17 - Aviator Amelia Earhart starts her attempt to become the first woman to successfully pilot an aircraft across the Atlantic Ocean (she succeeded the next day).
• June 20 - Shooting incident in Yugoslavian parliament - Punica Rasic shoots 3 opposition representatives and injures three others
• June 24 - Swedish aeroplane rescues part of Italian North Pole expedition, including Umberto Nobile. Soviet icebreaker Krasin saves the rest July 12
• June 28 - The Great Gorge and International Railway switches to one-man crews for its trolleys in Canada.
• June 29 - New York Governor Alfred E. Smith becomes the first Catholic nominated by a major political party for U.S. President, at the Democratic National Convention in Houston, Texas.
• July 6 - The world's largest hailstone falls in Potter, Nebraska.
• July 12 - Mexican aviator Emilio Carranza dies in a solo plane crash in the New Jersey Pine Barrens while returning from a goodwill flight to New York City.
• July 17 - José de León Toral assassinates Álvaro Obregón, president of Mexico.
• July 25 - U.S.A. recalls its troops from China
• July 27 - Tich Freeman becomes only bowler ever to take 200 first-class wickets before end of July.
• July 28 - Official opening ceremony of the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam.
• August 16 - Murderer Carl Panzram is arrested in Washington, DC after killing about 20 people.
• August 25 - Ahmet Zogu proclaims himself King Zog I of Albania; he is crowned September 1
• August 26 - May Donoghue finds the remains of a snail in her gingerbeer, launching Donoghue v. Stevenson.
• August 27 - The Kellogg-Briand Pact was signed in Paris - it was the first treaty which outlawed aggressive war.
• August 29 - Club Deportivo Motagua of Honduras is founded.

September-December

• September 1 - Richard Byrd leaves New York for Arctic.
• September 3 - Alexander Fleming discovers Penicillin.
• September 15 - Tich Freeman sets all-time record for number of wickets taken in an English cricket season.
• September 16 - The 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane kills at least 2,500 people in Florida.
• September 25 - Motorola is founded.
• October 2 - Saint Josemaria Escriva, founds Opus Dei
• October 7 - Haile Selassie crowned king (not yet emperor) of Abyssinia
• October 12 - An iron lung respirator is used for the first time at Children's Hospital, Boston.
• October 19 - William Edward Hickman is executed at San Quentin prison for the 1927 murder of Marian Parker.
• November 4 - At Park Central Hotel in Manhattan, Arnold Rothstein, New York City's most notorious gambler, is shot to death over a poker game.
• November 6 - Swedes start a tradition of eating Gustavus Adolphus pastries to commemorate the old warrior king.
• November 6 - U.S. presidential election, 1928: Republican Herbert Hoover wins by a wide margin over Democrat Alfred E. Smith.
• November 10 - Hirohito was enthroned as Emperor of Japan.
• November 17 - The Boston Garden opens in Boston.
• November 18 - Mickey Mouse appears in Steamboat Willie, the first sound cartoon.
• December 3 - In Rio de Janeiro, a seaplane sunk near Cap Arcona with Alberto Santos-Dumont on board.
• December 5 - Police disperses Sicilian gangs' meeting in Cleveland
• December 21 - U.S. Congress approves the construction of The Boulder Dam, later renamed The Hoover Dam
• December 31 - Bells of Big Ben first time in a radio

Unknown dates

• Charles King elected president of Liberia with 600,000 votes; the whole of country has only 15,000 voters.
• Chaco war
• Coca Cola enters Europe through the Amsterdam Olympics.
• Eliot Ness begins to lead the prohibition unit in Chicago.
• The old Canaanite city of Ugarit is rediscovered.
• Turkey switches from the Arabic to the Latin-based modern Turkish alphabet.
• The right to vote extended to all women in the United Kingdom.
• Frederick Griffith conducts Griffith's experiment, indirectly proving existence of DNA.
• First (and last) Best Title Writing Academy Award given.
• The Episcopal Church in the United States of America ratifies a new revision of the Book of Common Prayer.
• W2XBS, RCA's first television station, is established in New York City.
• Australian farmer, Jack Trott, finds Rhizanthella gardneri in his garden.
• Mount Vesuvius erupts.
• The first patent for the transistor principle was registered in Germany to Julius Edgar Lilienfeld.
• World population reached 2 billion people.

Births

January

• January 5 - Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, President of Pakistan and Prime Minister of Pakistan (d. 1979)
• January 5 - Walter Mondale, U.S. Senator and Presidential candidate
• January 7 - William Peter Blatty, American writer
• January 11 - David L. Wolper, American television producer
• January 16 - William Kennedy, American author
• January 17 - Jean Barraqué, French composer (d. 1973)
• January 17 - Vidal Sassoon, English cosmetologist
• January 22 - George A. Borgman, American jazz historian and journalist
• January 23 - Chico Carrasquel, Venezuelan Major League Baseball player (d. 2005)
• January 23 - Jeanne Moreau, French actress
• January 24 - Desmond Morris, English anthropologist and writer
• January 26 - Roger Vadim, French film director (d. 2000)
• January 30 - Hal Prince, American stage producer and director

February

• February 5 - Andrew Greeley, American Catholic priest and novelist
• February 9 - Frank Frazetta, American illustrator
• February 9 - Roger Mudd, American journalist
• February 22 - Bruce Forsyth, English entertainer
• February 23 - Vasili Lazarev, cosmonaut (d. 1990)
• February 26 - Fats Domino, American musician
• February 26 - Anatoli Filipchenko, cosmonaut
• February 27 - Ariel Sharon, Prime Minister of Israel

March-April

• March 4 - Alan Sillitoe, English writer
• March 6 - Gabriel García Márquez, Colombian writer, Nobel Prize laureate
• March 8 - Gerald Bull, Canadian engineer (d. 1990)
• March 10 - James Earl Ray, American assassin (d. 1998)
• March 12 - Edward Albee, American dramatist
• March 16 - Christa Ludwig, German mezzo-soprano
• March 19 - Hans Küng, Swiss theologian
• March 19 - Patrick McGoohan, Irish actor
• March 20 - Fred Rogers, American children's television host (d. 2003)
• March 24 - Byron Janis, American pianist
• March 25 - Jim Lovell, astronaut
• March 28 - Zbigniew Brzezinski, Polish-born U.S. National Security Advisor
• March 31 - Gordie Howe, Canadian hockey player
• March 31 - Lefty Frizzell, American country music performer
• April 1 - Jane Powell, American dancer, actress, and singer
• April 1 - George Grizzard, American actor
• April 2 - Serge Gainsbourg, French singer (d. 1991)
• April 4 - Maya Angelou, American poet and novelist
• April 6 - James D. Watson, American geneticist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
• April 7 - James Garner, American actor
• April 7 - Alan J. Pakula, American producer and director (d. 1998)
• April 7 - James White, Irish writer (d. 1999)
• April 8 - Eric Porter, English actor (d. 1995)
• April 9 - Tom Lehrer, American songwriter
• April 12 - Jean-François Paillard, French conductor
• April 19 - Alexis Korner, British musician (d. 1984)
• April 23 - Shirley Temple, American actress and politician

May-June

• May 1 - Desmond Titterington, Irish race car driver (d. 2002)
• May 3 - Dave Dudley, American singer (d. 2003)
• May 4 - Maynard Ferguson, Canadian jazz trumpeter
• May 4 - Hosni Mubarak, President of Egypt
• May 8 - Theodore Sorenson, American lawyer and speechwriter
• May 9 - Colin Chapman, English automotive engineer (d. 1982)
• May 9 - Pancho Gonzalez, American tennis player (d. 1995)
• May 9 - Barbara Ann Scott, Canadian figure skater
• May 12 - Burt Bacharach, American composer
• May 13 - Jim Shoulders, American rodeo cowboy
• May 16 - Billy Martin, baseball player and manager (d. 1989)
• May 18 - Pernell Roberts, American actor
• May 23 - Rosemary Clooney, American singer and actress (d. 2002)
• May 26 - Jack Kevorkian, American physician
• June 1 - Georgi Dobrovolski, cosmonaut (d. 1971)
• June 1 - Bob Monkhouse, English comedian and game show host (d. 2003)
• June 12 - Richard M. Sherman, American songwriter
• June 13 - John Forbes Nash, Jr., American mathematician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics
• June 14 - Ernesto Rafael Guevara de la Serna, Argentine-born revolutionary (d. 1967)
• June 19 - Nancy Marchand, American actress (d. 2000)
• June 25 - Alexei Alexeyevich Abrikosov, Russian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• June 26 - Jacob Druckman, American composer (d. 1996)
• June 28 - Harold Evans, British newspaper editor

July-September

• July 5 - Warren Oates, American actor (d. 1982)
• July 10 - Moshe Greenberg, America Bible scholar
• July 11 - Bobo Olson, American boxer (d. 2002)
• July 12 - Elias James Corey, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
• July 13 - Leroy Vinnegar, American musician (d. 1999)
• July 16 - Robert Sheckley, American writer
• July 25 - Keter Betts, American jazz bassist (d. 2005)
• July 26 - Stanley Kubrick, American film director (d. 1999)
• July 26 - Bernice Rubens, British novelist (d. 2004)
• August 6 - Andy Warhol, American artist (d. 1987)
• August 7 - James Randi, Canadian magician
• August 10 - Eddie Fisher, American singer
• August 12 - Bob Buhl, baseball player (d. 2001)
• August 15 - Nicolas Roeg, English film director
• August 18 - Marge Schott, baseball team owner (d. 2004)
• August 25 - Herbert Kroemer, German-born physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
• August 31 - Jaime Cardinal Sin, Filipinio Catholic cardinal (d. 2005)
• September 11 - William Kienzle, American author (d. 2001)
• September 15 - Julian Cannonball Adderley, American saxophonist
• September 19 - Adam West, American actor (famous for playing Batman)
• September 20 - Donald Hall, American poet and US Poet Laureate
• September 22 - James Lawson, American civil rights activist and minister
• September 30 - Elie Wiesel, Romanian Holocaust survivor, writer, and lecturer, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize

October-December

• October 1 - George Peppard, American actor (d. 1994)
• October 8 - Bill Maynard, British actor
• October 9 - Einojuhani Rautavaara, Finnish composer
• October 30 - Daniel Nathans, American microbiologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1999)
• November 3 - Osamu Tezuka, Japanese artist (d. 1989)
• November 3 - George Yardley, American basketball player (d. 2004)
• November 9 - Anne Sexton, American poet (d. 1974)
• November 10 - Ennio Morricone, Italian composer
• November 11 - Carlos Fuentes, Mexican writer
• November 17 - Rance Howard, American actor
• November 18 - Otar Gordeli, Georgian composer
• November 29 - Paul Simon, U.S. Senator from Illinois (d. 2003)
• December 7 - Noam Chomsky, American linguist
• December 15 - Friedensreich Hundertwasser, Austrian artist (d. 2000)
• December 16 - Philip K. Dick, American author (d. 1982)
• December 25 - Dick Miller, American actor
• December 31 - Siné, French cartoonist

Unknown date

• Sultan Azlan Muhibbudin Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Yusuff Izzudin Shah Ghafarullahu-lahu, King of Malaysia
• Norman Carlberg, American sculptor

Deaths

• January 1 - Loie Fuller, American dancer (b. 1862)
• January 6 - Alvin Kraenzlein, American athlete (b. 1876)
• January 11 - Thomas Hardy, English writer (b. 1840)
• January 29 - Douglas Haig, British soldier (b. 1861)
• January 30 - Johannes Andreas Grib Fibiger, Danish scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1867)
• February 1 - Hughie Jennings, baseball player (b. 1869)
• February 4 - Hendrik Lorentz, Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1853)
• February 15 - Herbert Henry Asquith, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1852)
• February 16 - Eddie Foy, American vaudevillian (b. 1856)
• April 2 - Theodore William Richards, American chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1868)
• April 5 - Roy Kilner, English cricketer (b. 1890)
• May 22 - Francisco López Merino, Argentine poet (b. 1904)
• June 4 - Chang Tso-lin, Chinese warlord (b. 1873)
• June 16 - Mark Keppel, Superintendent of Los Angeles County Schools (b. 1867)
• June 22 - A. B. Frost, American illustrator (b. 1851)
• August 12 - Leoš Janáček, Czech composer (b. 1854)
• August 30 - Wilhelm Wien, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1864)
• October 13 - Dagmar of Denmark, later Maria Fyodorovna, wife of Tsar Alexander III and Empress Consort of Russia (b. 1847)
• October 22 - Andrew Fisher, fifth Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1862)
• December 1 - José Eustasio Rivera, Colombian writer (b. 1888)
• December 10 - Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Scottish architect (b. 1868)
• Robert Abbe, American surgeon (b. 1851)

Nobel prizes

• Physics - Owen Willans Richardson
• Chemistry - Adolf Otto Reinhold Windaus
• Physiology or Medicine - Charles Jules Henri Nicolle
• Literature - Sigrid Undset
• Peace - not awarded

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