October 28 in history

On October 28:

1510 Francis Borgia, Spanish duke and Jesuit priest was born.

Saint Francis Borgia. He is depicted performing an exorcism in this painting by Francisco Goya.

1538 The first university n the New World, the Universidad Santo Tomás de Aquino in the Dominican Republic, was established.

1664 The Duke of York and Albany’s Maritime Regiment of Foot, later to be known as the Royal Marines, was established.

1697 Canaletto, Italian artist, was born.

1846 Georges Auguste Escoffier, French chef, was born.

1848 The first railway in Spain – between Barcelona and Mataró – wass opened

1886 President Grover Cleveland dedicated the Statue of Liberty.

1890 New Zealand’s first Labour Day celebrations took place.

1893 Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 in B Minor, Pathétique, received its premiere performance in St. Petersburg.

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky by Nikolay Kuznetsov, 1893

1903 Evelyn Waugh, English writer, was born.

1914 Jonas Salk, American biologist and physician, was born.

1918 Czechoslovakia was granted independence from Austria-Hungary.

1927 Dame Cleo Laine, English singer. was born.

1929 Joan Plowright, English actress was born.

1941 Hank Marvin,lead guitarist for The SHadows, was born.

1942 The Alaska Highway (Alcan Highway) was completed through Canada to Fairbanks, Alaska.

1946 Australian politician, former leader of the Liberal Party, John Hewson, was born.

1948 – Swiss chemist Paul Müller was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the insecticidal properties of DDT.

1954 The modern Kingdom of the Netherlands was re-founded as a federal monarchy.

1955 Bill Gates, American software executive, was born.

1960 Landon Curt Noll, Astronomer, Cryptographer and Mathematician: youngest to hold the world record for the largest known prime 3 times, was born.

 

1965 Nostra Aetate, the “Declaration on the Relation of the Church with Non-Christian Religions” of the Second Vatican Council, is promulgated by Pope Paul VI; it absolves the Jews of the alleged killing of Jesus, reversing Innocent III’s 760 year-old declaration.

1967 Julia Roberts, American actress, was born.

1970 Gary Gabelich set a land speed record in a rocket-powered automobile called the Blue Flame, fueled with natural gas.

1970 Britain launched its first (and so far, only) satellite, Prospero, into low Earth orbit atop a Black Arrow carrier rocket.

1982 Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) won elections, leading to first Socialist government in Spain after death of Franco.  Felipe Gonzalez became Prime Minister-elect.

2007 Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner became the first woman elected President of Argentina.

Sourced from NZ History Online and Wikipedia.