On this day...July 28
1586 Sir Thomas Harriot introduces potatoes to Europe
1588 Spanish Armada sails to overthrow England's Queen Elizabeth I
1609 Admiral George Somers settles in Bermuda
1821 Peru declares independence from Spain (National Day)
1830 Revolution in France replaces Charles X with Louis Philippe
1849 Memmon is 1st clipper to reach SF, 120 days out of NY
1851 Total solar eclipse captured on a daguerreotype photograph
1862 Confederate forces defeated at More's Hill, Mo
1864 Atlanta Campaign-Battle of Ezra Church
1866 Metric system becomes a legal measurement system in US
1868 14th Amendment ratified, citizenship to exslaves
1882 The opera "Parsifal" is produced (Bayreuth)
1883 Shocks triggered by the volcano Epomeo (Isle of Ischia, Italy)
destroyed 1,200 houses at Casamicciola killing 2,000
1896 City of Miami incorporated
1898 Start of Sherlock Holmes "Adventure of the Retired Colourman"(BG)
1900 Hamburger created by Louis Lassing in Connecticut
1906 Yankees turn triple-play, beat Cleveland 6-4
1913 US wins its 1st Davis Cup since 1902, beating England, 3-2
1914 Austria-Hungary attacks Serbia-WW I begins
1914 Foxtrot 1st danced at New Amsterdam Roof Garden (NYC, by Harry Fox)
1915 10,000 blacks march on 5th Ave (NYC) protesting lynchings
1915 US forces invade Haiti, stays until 1924
1928 Olympics open at Amsterdam
1929 Chicago Cardinals become 1st NFL team to train out of state (Mich)
1930 114ø F (46ø C), Greensburg, Kentucky (state record)
1931 Congress makes "The Star-Spangled Banner" our 2nd national anthem
1931 White Sox score 11 in 8th to beat Yankees 14-12
1932 Pres Hoover evicts bonus marchers from their encampment
1933 1st singing telegram delivered (to Rudy Vallee), NYC
1933 NFL divides into 2, 5 team divisions
1934 118ø F (48ø C), Orofino, Idaho (state record)
1935 G Neujmin discovers asteroid #1386 Storeria
1938 K Reinmuth discovers asteroid #1485 Isa
1940 Yankee Charle Keller hits 3 HRs to beat White Sox 10-9
1942 Nazis liquidate 10,000 Jews in Minsk Russia
1943 Italian Facist dictator Benito Mussolini resigns
1943 Pres FDR announces end of coffee rationing in US
1945 US Army bomber crashes into 79th floor of Empire State Bldg, 14 die
1945 US Senate ratifies UN charter 89-2
1948 I.G. Farben chemical plant explodes in Ludwigshafen, Germany, 182 die
1951 Walt Disney's "Alice In Wonderland" released
1957 White Sox' James Landis struck out 5 times in a game
1959 Hawaii's 1st US election sends 1st Asian-Americans to Congress
1960 Republican National convention selects Richard Nixon
1962 19 die in a train crash in Steelton Pa
1962 Mariner I launched to Mars falls into Atlantic Ocean
1964 Ranger 7 launched toward the Moon; sent back 4308 TV pictures
1967 Pirate Radio Station 390 (Radio Invicta) (England) closes down
1971 16 time gold glover Brook Robinson commits 3 errors in 6th inning
1973 Skylab 3's astronauts (Bean, Garriott & Lousma) launched
1974 69 die when packed bus strikes heavy truck (Belem, Brazil)
1976 242,000 die in Tientsin-Tangshan (China) 8.2 earthquake
1976 Eldon Joersz & Geo Morgan set world air speed record of 3,530 kph
1976 White Sox John Odom (5 inn) & Francisco Barrios (4 inn) no-hits A's
1977 1st oil flow through the Alaska pipeline
1977 Roy Wilkins turn over NAACP leadership to Benjamin L Hooks
1978 600,000 attend Watkins Glen Summer Jam in NY
1978 At Old Timer's Game it's announced Martin will again manage Yankees
1978 Perth Observatory discovers asteroid #3188 & #3422
1978 Price of gold tops $200-an-oz level for 1st time
1979 Dave Kingman becomes 6th to have a 2nd 3 HR game
1980 Fernando Bela£nde Terry becomes president of Peru
1983 AL Pres Lee MacPhail threw out umpire's decision & allows
George Brett's 2 run HR against Yanks on July 24 (pine tar game)
NASA launches Telstar-3A
1984 23rd modern Olympic games opens in Los Angeles
1986 NASA releases transcript from doomed Challenger, pilot Michael Smith
could be heard saying, "Uh-oh!" as spacecraft disintegrated
1987 Angel Cordero Jr becomes the 4th jockey to win 6,000 races
1988 IBM announces price hike on older models
1988 Israeli diplomats arrive in Moscow for 1st visit in 21 years
1988 Jordan cancels $1.3 billion development plan in West Bank
1988 Winnie Mandella's home in Soweto, South Africa destroyed by arson
1988 Yanks' Tommy John makes 3 errors on 1 play yet beats Brewers 16-3
1989 Braves Dale Murphy, hits 2 3-run HRs in an inning, 14th man to hit
2 HRs in an inning. Also ties record of 6 RBIs in an inning
NASA's Lewis Research Center, Cleve, announce new high-temperature
superconductors able to operate at 33 to 37 Gigahertz
1990 Blackout hits Chicago
1991 Buffalo Bills beat Phila Eagles, 17-13 in American Bowl in Wembley
1991 Expo's Dennis Martinez pitches baseball's 15th perfect game (Dodgers)
1991 Miguel Indurain of Spain wins the Tour de France bicycle race
2061 31st recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet