Independence
day
Japan
UN
Day
World
Day for Safety and Health at Work
Events
of the day
357 – Emperor Constantius II
enters Rome for the first time to celebrate his
victory over Magnus Magnentius.
1192 – Assassination of Conrad of Montferrat (Conrad
I), King of Jerusalem, in Tyre, two days after
his title to the throne is confirmed by election.
The killing is carried out by Hashshashin.
1253 – Nichiren, a Japanese Buddhist monk, propounds
Nam Myoho Renge Kyo for the very first time and
declares it to be the essence of Buddhism, in
effect founding Nichiren Buddhism.
1503 – The Battle of Cerignola is fought. It is
noted as the first battle in history won by small
arms fire using gunpowder.
1611 – Establishment of the Pontifical and Royal
University of Santo Tomas, The Catholic University
of the Philippines, the largest Catholic university
in the world.
1788 – Maryland becomes the seventh state to ratify
the Constitution of the United States.
1789 – Mutiny on the Bounty: Lieutenant William
Bligh and 18 sailors are set adrift and the rebel
crew returns to Tahiti briefly and then sets sail
for Pitcairn Island.
1792 – France invades the Austrian Netherlands
(present day Belgium), beginning the French Revolutionary
War.
1796 – The Armistice of Cherasco is signed by
Napoleon Bonaparte and Vittorio Amedeo III, the
King of Sardinia, expanding French territory along
the Mediterranean coast.
1869 – Chinese and Irish laborers for the Central
Pacific Railroad working on the First Transcontinental
Railroad lay 10 miles of track in one day, a feat
which has never been matched.
1887 – A week after being arrested by the Prussian
Secret Police, Alsatian police inspector Guillaume
Schnaebelé is released on order of German Emperor
William I, defusing a possible war.
1910 – Frenchman Louis Paulhan wins the 1910 London
to Manchester air race, the first long-distance
aeroplane race in England.
1920 – Azerbaijan is added to the Soviet Union.
1930 – The first night game in organized baseball
history takes place in Independence, Kansas.
1932 – A vaccine for yellow fever is announced
for use on humans.
1944 – World War II: Nine German E-boats attacked
US and UK units during Exercise Tiger, the rehearsal
for the Normandy landings, killing 946.
1945 – Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara
Petacci are executed by a firing squad consisting
of members of the Italian resistance movement.
1947 – Thor Heyerdahl and five crew mates set
out from Peru on the Kon-Tiki to prove that Peruvian
natives could have settled Polynesia.
1948 – Igor Stravinsky conducted the premier of
his American ballet, Orpheus, in New York City
at New York City Center.
1949 – Former First Lady of the Philippines Aurora
Quezon, 61, is assassinated while en route to
dedicate a hospital in memory of her late husband;
her daughter and 10 others are also killed.
1950 – Bhumibol Adulyadej marries Queen Sirikit
after their quiet engagement in Lausanne, Switzerland
on July 19, 1949.
1952 – Dwight D. Eisenhower resigns as Supreme
Allied Commander of NATO.
1952 – Occupied Japan: The United States occupation
of Japan ends as the Treaty of San Francisco,
ratified September 8, 1951, comes into force.
1952 – The Sino-Japanese Peace Treaty (Treaty
of Taipei) is signed in Taipei, Taiwan between
Japan and the Republic of China to officially
end the Second Sino-Japanese War.
1965 – United States occupation of the Dominican
Republic: American troops land in the Dominican
Republic to "forestall establishment of a
Communist dictatorship" and to evacuate U.S.
Army troops.
1969 – Charles de Gaulle resigns as President
of France.
1970 – Vietnam War: U.S. President Richard M.
Nixon formally authorizes American combat troops
to fight communist sanctuaries in Cambodia.
1975 – General Cao Van Vien, chief of the South
Vietnamese military, departs for the US as the
North Vietnamese Army closed in on victory.
1977 – The Red Army Faction trial ends, with Andreas
Baader, Gudrun Ensslin and Jan-Carl Raspe found
guilty of four counts of murder and more than
30 counts of attempted murder.
1977 – The Budapest Treaty on the International
Recognition of the Deposit of Microorganisms for
the Purposes of Patent Procedure is signed.
1978 – President of Afghanistan, Mohammed Daoud
Khan, is overthrown and assassinated in a coup
led by pro-communist rebels.
1986 – The United States Navy aircraft carrier
USS Enterprise becomes the first nuclear-powered
aircraft carrier to transit the Suez Canal, navigating
from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea to relieve
the USS Coral Sea.
1987 – American engineer Ben Linder is killed
in an ambush by U.S.-funded Contras in northern
Nicaragua.
1988 – Near Maui, Hawaii, flight attendant Clarabelle
"C.B." Lansing is blown out of Aloha
Airlines Flight 243, a Boeing 737, and falls to
her death when part of the plane's fuselage rips
open in mid-flight.
1994 – Former Central Intelligence Agency counter-intelligence
officer and analyst Aldrich Ames pleads guilty
to giving U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union and
later Russia.
1996 – Whitewater controversy: President Bill
Clinton gives a 4½ hour videotaped testimony for
the defense.
1996 – In Tasmania, Australia, Martin Bryant goes
on a shooting spree, killing 35 people and seriously
injuring 21 more.
1999 – In Alberta, Canada, 14-year-old Todd Cameron
Smith fires upon three students, killing one and
wounding another in the W. R. Myers High School
shooting.
2001 – Millionaire Dennis Tito becomes the world's
first space tourist.
2008 – A train collision in Shandong, China, kills
72 people and injures 416 more.
Holidays
and observances
Christian
Feast Day:
Louis de Montfort
Peter Chanel
Vitalis and Valeria of Milan
April 28 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Feast of Jamál ("Beauty"), the first
day of the third month of the Bahá'à calendar.
(Bahá'à Faith)
National Day of Mourning, to commemorate workers
killed, injured, or suffering illness from occupational
hazards and accidents. (Canada)
Workers Memorial Day (International)
World Day for Safety and Health at Work (International)
National Heroes Day (Barbados)
National Day (Sardinia)
The first day of the Floralia, in honor of Flora.
(Roman Empire)
For details, contact Datacentre
