On This Day

[Altobelli]

28 DECEMBER

1065 Westminster Abbey was consecrated. Its founder Edward the Confessor could not attend due to illness. He died on 5th January l066 and was buried in a shrine before the High Altar in his new church.

1612 First observation of Neptune - Galileo observes and records a "fixed star" without realising it is a planet

1694 Mary II, joint sovereign of England, Scotland and Ireland, died from smallpox, leaving William III to reign alone.

1734 The death of Robert Roy MacGregor, usually known simply as Rob Roy, the famous Scottish folk hero and outlaw of the early 18th century. He is buried in Balquhidder churchyard - see picture.

1767 King Taksin crowned King of Thailand and establishes Thonburi as his capital

1836 Spain recognizes independence of Mexico

1860 Harriet Tubman arrives in Auburn, New York, on her last mission to free slaves, having evaded capture for 8 years on the Underground Railroad

1879 The Tay railway bridge collapsed whilst the Edinburgh to Dundee train was crossing. The original crossing was the longest railway bridge in the world but during the storm the wind was said to have blown the iron girders in the central section away 'like matchwood. The engine and carriages plummeted into the icy river below killing 59 people. In 1979 British Rail commissioned a special train to take people across the new bridge at the exact time of the original accident ....... 19:15 GMT. On 28th December 2013 granite memorials to commemorate the disaster were unveiled on both sides of the river.

1904 The first weather reports relayed by wireless telegraphy were published in London.

1908 Earthquake strikes Messina, Italy, killing nearly 80,000

1918 Constance Markievicz, Irish Sinn Féin politician and suffragette, whilst detained in Holloway prison, became the first woman to be elected MP to the House of Commons.

1932 Roy Hattersley, Labour MP & former Labour deputy leader, was born.

1934 The first Test Match for women’s cricket was between Australia and England and was held at Brisbane. England beat Australia 2–0 in a three-Test series, with the final match drawn.

1934 Dame Maggie Smith, British actress was born. She made her stage debut in 1952 and has won numerous awards for acting, both for the stage and for film, including five BAFTA Awards, plus the BAFTA Fellowship Award. She currently stars in the drama, Downton Abbey as Violet Crawley, the Dowager-Countess of Grantham, for which she has won an Emmy.

1943 The birth of Richard Whiteley. He was best known for his twenty three years as host of the game show Countdown. At the time of his death in 2005 Whiteley was believed to have clocked more hours on British television screens than anyone else alive.

1943 All Kalmyk inhabitants of the Republic of Kalmukkie deported by the Soviet Union to Central Asia and Siberia. Many die en route.

1950 Derbyshire's Peak District became Britain’s first National Park.

1957 The Stanley abattoir in Liverpool (one of Britain's largest) closed down after foot and mouth disease was found in cattle.

1963 'That Was The Week That Was', television’s first satirical show, was broadcast for the last time. It was taken off air while still commanding huge audiences because 1964 was to be election year and it was felt that the show could influence voters.

1968 100,000 attend Miami Pop Festival

1968 Beatles' "White Album" goes #1 & stays #1 for 9 weeks

1968 Israeli assault on Beirut Airport

1971 Hashish now falls under the Dutch Opium Law (Opiumwet)

1972 Kim Il-song becomes president of North Korea

1972 Martin Bormann's skeleton is found in Berlin (Hitlers deputy)

1974 6.3 earthquake strikes Pakistan: 5200 killed

1975 Earthquake in Pakistan, 4,000 die


1975 Gary Cosier scores 109 v West Indies at MCG on Test Cricket debut

1980 A shake-up of broadcasting franchises paved the way for the launch of breakfast TV. The Independent Broadcasting Authority announced that the breakfast contract would go to TV-am and would launch in 1983.


1983 Gavaskar achieves his 30th century, beating Bradman's record of 29

1993 Customs officials at Felixstowe seized £70m of Colombian cocaine thought to be linked to the Mafia.

2003 The British Government announced plans to tighten airline security by allowing armed guards on some British flights to the USA.

2012 Vladimir Putin signs into law a ban on US adoption of Russian children

2015 Japan and South Korea reach agreement over WWII "comfort women", Japan apologies and pays 1bn yen compensation


Famous Birthday's

Woodrow Wilson
(1856 - 1924)



1872 PÃ*o Baroja y Nessi, Spanish Basque writer, author of over 100 novels (The Struggle for Life, Zalacain the Adventurer), born in San Sebastián, Basque Country (d. 1956)

1943 Richard Whiteley, British television presenter (d. 2005)

Nigel Kennedy
61st Birthday

Terry Butcher
59th Birthday

1945 Dwight Bement, rocker (Gary Puckett & Union Gap-Young Girl)
72nd Birthday

Roy Hattersley
85th Birthday

Maggie Smith
83rd Birthday

Denzel Washington
63rd Birthday

Famous Deaths


Rob Roy
( - 1734)

Ante Pavelić
(1889 - 1959)

1983 Dennis Wilson, drummer/singer (Beach Boys), drowns at 39

Susan Sontag
(1933 - 2004)

2010 Agathe von Trapp, Austrian-born American singer (oldest von Trapp child), dies at 97

2015 Lemmy [Ian Kilmister], British heavy metal musician (Motörhead), dies from terminal illness at 70

2016 Debbie Reynolds, American actress (Kathy Selden-Singin' in the Rain, The Unsinkable Molly Brown), dies of a stroke at 84 one day after her daughter Carrie Fisher also passed away

Famous Weddings

1936 British best-selling romantic author Barbara Cartland (35) marries 2nd husband Hugh McCorquodale

1936 Football player Bronko Nagurski (28) weds childhood sweetheart Eileen Kane in International Falls, Minnesota

1950 Author John Steinbeck (48) weds actress Elaine Anderson (36)

1956 Actress Elizabeth Montgomery (23) weds actor Gig Young (43)

1956 Singer Patti Page (29) weds choreographer Charles O'Curran in Las Vegas, Nevada

Famous Divorces

1942 Actress Janet Leigh (14) divorces childhood sweetheart John Kenneth Carlisle (18) 4 months after getting married

2010 Film and record company executive Justin Siegel (23) divorces actress-singer Emmy Rossum due to irreconcilable differences after a year-and-a-half of marriage

2012 Astronaut Buzz Aldrin (82) divorces Lois Driggs Cannon due to irreconcilable differences after 23 years of marriage