1928

1928 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 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 – 1928 Winter Olympic Games open in St. Moritz, Switzerland
• February 12 – Heavy hails kill 11 in England
• February 25 – Charles Jenkins Laboratories of Washington, DC becomes the first holder of a television license from the Federal Radio Commission.
• March 11 – Blizzard in England; In London temperature drops to 9 degrees Celsius
• March 12 – Malta becomes a British dominion
• March 12 – In California, the St. Francis Dam fails killing 400
• March 21 – Charles Lindbergh is presented the Congressional Medal of Honor for his first trans-Atlantic flight.
• April 12 – Bomb attack against the King of Italy in Milan – 17 bystanders dead
• April 22 – Earthquake destroys Corinth – 200.000 buildings destroyed
• May 15-17 – Christian X of Denmark visits Finland
• 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-September

• June 11 – Medical doctor's strike begins in Vienna
• June 13 – Nobel prize winner John Forbes Nash, Jr. is born.
• June 14 – Students take over the medical wing of Rosario University in Argentina
• 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 Pine Barrens of southern New Jersey while returning from a goodwill flight to New York City.
• 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
• July 16 Leon Toral assassinates Álvaro Obregón, president of Mexico
• July 25 – USA recalls its troops from China
• July 27 – Tich Freeman becomes only bowler ever to take 200 first-class wickets before end of July.
• 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 28 – The Kellogg-Briand Pact was signed in Paris – it was the first treaty which outlawed aggressive war.
• September 1 – Richard Byrd leaves New York for Arctic
• 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.

October-December

• October 2 Saint Josemaria Escriva, under divine inspiration, founded 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.
• 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 king.
• November 6 – U.S. presidential election, 1928: Republican Herbert Hoover wins by a wide margin over Democrat Alfred E. Smith.
• 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 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 the Griffith experiment, indirectly proving existence of DNA.
• Motorola is founded.
• First (and last) Best Title Writing Academy Award given.
• The Episcopal Church ratifies a new revision of the Book of Common Prayer.
• W2XBS, RCA's first television station, is established in New York City.

Year in topic

• 1928 in aviation
• 1928 in film
  • Sunrise
• 1928 in literature
  • Strange Fugitive by Morley Callaghan
• 1928 in music
• 1928 in rail transport
• 1928 in science
• 1928 in sports
  • February 11 – 2nd Olympic Winter Games open in St. Moritz, Switzerland.
  • Summer Olympic Games in Amsterdam Netherlands
• 1928 in television
  • May 11 – The first regular schedule of TV programming is begun in the United States by the General Electric company. Programs are transmitted Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday afternoons from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m.
  • July 12 – First televised tennis match.
  • August 22 – Alfred E. Smith accepts the Democratic presidential nomination, with WGY simulcasting the event on radio and Television. This was the first live broadcast and the first television news event.
  • September 11 – The first broadcast of a play on television, The Queen's Messenger (W2XAD).

Births

January

• January 5 – Walter Mondale, U.S. Senator and Presidential candidate
• January 5 – Ali Bhutto, President and Prime Minister of Pakistan (d. 1979)
• January 7 – William Peter Blatty, screenwriter
• January 8 – Sander Vanocur, journalist
• January 11 – David L. Wolper, producer
• January 16 – William Kennedy, American author
• January 17 – Jean Barraqué, French composer (d. 1973)
• January 17  – Vidal Sassoon, cosmetologist
• January 23 – Jeanne Moreau, French actress
• January 24 – Desmond Morris, 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 Roman Catholic priest and novelist
• February 9 – Frank Frazetta, American illustrator
• February 9  – Roger Mudd, American journalist
• February 11 – Conrad Janis, actor
• February 11  – Archibald Forster, CEO of Esso
• February 11  – Gerry Alexander, West Indies cricketer
• February 11  – Raoul Cita, rocker
• 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
• February 27  – Alfred Hrdlicka, sculptor and graphic artist

March-April

• March 3 – France Križanič, Slovenian mathematician (d. 2002)
• March 4 – Alan Sillitoe, English writer
• March 6 – Gabriel García Márquez, Colombian writer, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature
• 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, singer
• April 2 – Serge Gainsbourg, French singer (d. 1991)
• April 4 – Maya Angelou, American poet and novelist
• April 6 – James D. Watson, American geneticist, Nobel Prize laureate
• April 7 – James Garner, American actor
• April 7  – Alan J. Pakula, American producer and director (d. 1998)
• April 9 – Tom Lehrer, American satirical songwriter
• April 12 – Jean-François Paillard, French conductor

May-September

• 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 16 – Billy Martin, baseball player and manager (d. 1989)
• May 18 – Pernell Roberts, American actor
• May 23 – Nigel Davenport, 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 19 – Nancy Marchand, actress (d. 2000)
• July 5 – Warren Oates, American character actor (d. 1982)
• July 11 – Bobo Olson, American boxer (d. 2002)
• July 16 – Robert Sheckley, American science fiction writer
• 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 10 – Eddie Fisher, American singer
• August 12 – Bob Buhl, Major League Baseball player (d. 2001)
• August 15 – Nicolas Roeg, English film director
• August 18 – Marge Schott, Major League Baseball team owner (d. 2004)
• August 25 – Herbert Kroemer, German physicist
• September 14 – Angus Ogilvy, husband of Princess Alexandra of Kent (d. 2004)
• September 15 – Julian Cannonball Adderley, American saxophonist
• September 19 – Adam West, American actor
• September 22 – James Lawson, American civil rights activist and minister

October-December

• October 1 – George Peppard, American actor (d. 1994)
• October 8 – Bill Maynard, British actor
• October 9 – Einojuhani Rautavaara, Finnish composer
• November 3 – Osamu Tezuka, Japanese artist (d. 1989)
• November 3 – George Yardley, American basketball player (d. 2004)
• November 10 – Ennio Morricone, Italian film music composer
• November 11 – Carlos Fuentes, Panamanian writer
• December 7 – Noam Chomsky, American linguist and political dissident
• December 15 – Friedensreich Hundertwasser, Austrian artist (d. 2000)
• December 16 – Philip K. Dick, American author (d. 1982)

Unknown date

• Sultan Azlan Muhibbudin Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Yusuff Izzudin Shah Ghafarullahu-lahu, Sultan of Perak and 9th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia

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)
• February 1 – Hughie Jennings, Baseball Hall of Famer (b. 1869)
• February 4 – Hendrik Lorentz, Dutch physicist and 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, Nobel Prize in Chemistry recipient (b. 1868)
• June 4 – Chang Tso-lin, Chinese warlord (b. 1873)
• August 12 – Leos Janacek, Czech composer (b. 1854)
• August 30 – Wilhelm Wien, German physicist (b. 1864)
• October 22 – Andrew Fisher, fifth Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1862)
• December 1 – José Eustasio Rivera, Colombian writer (b. 1888)
• Robert Abbe, American surgeon (b. 1851)

Nobel Prizes

• Physics – Owen Willans Richardson
• Chemistry – Adolf Otto Reinhold Windaus
• Medicine – Charles Jules Henri Nicolle
• Literature – Sigrid Undset
• Peace – Not awarded.