History of 28 October
1904 – The St. Louis Police Department became the first to use fingerprinting.
1919 – The U.S. Congress enacted the Volstead Act, also known as the National Prohibition Act. Prohibition was repealed in 1933 with the passing of the 21st Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
1922 – Benito Mussolini took control of the Italian government and introduced fascism to Italy.
1936 – The Statue of Liberty was rededicated by U.S. President Roosevelt on its 50th anniversary.
1940 – During World War II, Italy invaded Greece.
1949 – U.S. President Harry Truman swore in Eugenie Moore Anderson as the U.S. ambassador to Denmark. Anderson was the first woman to hold the post of ambassador.
1958 – Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli was elected Pope. He took the name, John XXIII.
1962 – Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev informed the U.S. that he had ordered the dismantling of Soviet missile bases in Cuba.
1965 – Pope Paul VI issued a decree absolving Jews of collective guilt for the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
1965 – The Gateway Arch along the waterfront in St. Louis, MO, was completed.
1976 – John D. Ehrlichman, a former aide to U.S. President Richard Nixon, entered a federal prison camp in Safford, AZ, to begin serving his sentence for Watergate-related convictions.
1982 – Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev condemned the U.S. for an arms buildup.
1983 – The U.S. vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution “deeply deploring” the ongoing U.S.-led invasion of Grenada.
1985 – John A. Walker Jr. and his son, Michael Lance Walker, pled guilty to charges of spying for the Soviet Union.
1986 – The centennial of the Statue of Liberty was celebrated in New York.
1988 – Roussel Uclaf, a French manufacturer that produces the abortion pill RU486, announced it would resume distribution of the drug after the government of France demanded it does so.
1990 – Iraq announced that it was halting gasoline rationing.
1993 – Ousted Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, called for a complete blockade of Haiti to force out the military leaders.
1994 – U.S. President Clinton visited Kuwait and implied that all the troops there would be home by Christmas.
1996 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained a record of 337.17 points (or 5%). The day before the Dow had dropped 554.26 points (or 7%).
2005 – I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby is indicted due to his involvement in the Plame affair.
2006 – A funeral service takes place at the Bykivnia graves for those Ukrainians who were killed by the Soviet secret police.
2007 – Cristina Fernández de Kirchner becomes the first woman elected President of Argentina.
2009 – The 28 October 2009 Peshawar bombing kills 117 and wounds 213.
2009 – NASA successfully launches the Ares I-X mission, the only rocket launch for its short-lived Constellation program.
2013 – Five people are killed and 38 are injured after a car crashes into barriers at the Tiananmen Square in China.
2014 – A rocket carrying NASA’s Cygnus CRS Orb-3 resupply mission to the International Space Station explodes seconds after taking off from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport in Virginia.
Celebrating Birthday Today
- 1981 – Solomon Andargachew, Ethiopian footballer
- 1981 – Milan Baros, Czech footballer
- 1981 – Shane Gore, English footballer
- 1981 – Nate McLouth, American baseball player
- 1981 – Nick Montgomery, English-Scottish footballer
- 1982 – Jeremy Bonderman, American baseball player
- 1982 – Enver Jääger, Estonian footballer
- 1982 – Anthony Lerew, American baseball player
- 1982 – Hironori Saruta, Japanese footballer
- 1982 – Matt Smith, English actor, and director
- 1983 – Jarrett Jack, American basketball player
- 1983 – Kayo Noro, Japanese singer, and actress
- 1983 – Joe Thomas, English actor and screenwriter
- 1984 – Bryn Evans, New Zealand rugby player
- 1984 – Obafemi Martins, Nigerian footballer
- 1984 – Finn Wittrock, American actor
- 1985 – Tyrone Barnett, English footballer
- 1985 – Anthony Fantano, American music critic
- 1986 – Anthony Griffith, English footballer
- 1986 – Aki Toyosaki, Japanese voice actress and singer
- 1987 – Frank Ocean, American singer-songwriter
- 1988 – Edd Gould, English cartoonist, and animator (d. 2012)
- 1988 – Jamie xx, English musician, DJ, record producer, and remixer
- 1989 – Camille Muffat, French swimmer (d. 2015)
- 1991 – Lucy Bronze, English footballer
- 1992 – Maria Sergejeva, Estonian figure skater
- 1995 – Glen Kamara, Finnish footballer
- 1996 – Jasmine Jessica Anthony, American actress
- 1996 – Jack Eichel, American ice hockey player
- 1996 – Una Raymond-Hoey, Irish cricketer
- 1997 – Taylor Fritz, an American tennis player
- 1998 – Nolan Gould, American actor