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Explore 28 November

Explore 28 November: Magellan’s ships sail out into the Pacific, New Zealand’s women vote in a national election for the first time, the ‘Big Three’ meet at Tehran and Mauritania becomes independent. Meet William Blake, Friedrich Engels and Stefan Zweig, born on this date.

This day through time →9 verified events across 4 eras

⌛9Full
Timeline ◈5Historic
Moments ♙7Born
Today ✦6Lives
Remembered ◉1Firsts &
Discoveries ♫1Culture
Stories ☉1Observances
Ferdinand Magellan, in a portrait painted in the late sixteenth or early seventeenth century.
Ferdinand Magellan, in a portrait painted in the late sixteenth or early seventeenth century.
Image creditUnknown authorUnknown author · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1520

Magellan’s ships sail out into the Pacific

Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese captain sailing for Spain, set out in 1519 to reach the Spice Islands by sailing west. On 21 October 1520 his ships entered a winding channel near the southern tip of South America, now the Strait of Magellan.

After more than a month of threading through it, and the desertion of one ship, the three remaining vessels came out into the open ocean on 28 November 1520. Magellan called it the Pacific, the peaceful sea. He was killed in the Philippines in 1521, but one ship, the Victoria, completed the first voyage round the world in 1522.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Strait of Magellan ↗
'Victory', a cartoon in the New Zealand Graphic celebrating the passing of women's franchise, September 1893.
‘Victory’, a cartoon in the New Zealand Graphic celebrating the passing of women’s franchise, September 1893.
Image creditAshley Hunter (1854 - 1932) see [3] · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1893

New Zealand’s women vote in a general election

In September 1893 New Zealand became the first self-governing country in which women won the right to vote in parliamentary elections, after petitions signed by tens of thousands of women.

Just ten weeks later, on 28 November 1893, more than 90,000 women went to the polls. About 82 per cent of those enrolled voted, a higher turnout than among men, and the day passed in what one Christchurch newspaper called the atmosphere of a garden party.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: NZHistory (Ministry for Culture and Heritage): Women vote in first general election ↗
Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill with their chiefs of staff on the portico of the Soviet embassy in Tehran, 1943.
Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill with their chiefs of staff on the portico of the Soviet embassy in Tehran, 1943.
Image creditUnited States Army 12th Air Force · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1943

The ‘Big Three’ meet at Tehran

Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin met together for the first time in Tehran, the capital of Iran, from 28 November to 1 December 1943.

The American and British leaders committed themselves to invading northern France, the operation that became D-Day, by May 1944. Stalin promised in principle to join the war against Japan once Germany was beaten, and the three began to discuss Poland’s post-war borders and a new world organisation, the future United Nations.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: US Department of State, Office of the Historian: The Tehran Conference, 1943 ↗
Moktar Ould Daddah, Mauritania's first head of government and president, in 1960.
Moktar Ould Daddah, Mauritania’s first head of government and president, in 1960.
Image creditUnknown authorUnknown author · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1960

Mauritania becomes independent

The Islamic Republic of Mauritania, a vast desert land in north-west Africa ruled by France since the early twentieth century, declared its independence on 28 November 1960. It was proclaimed in Nouakchott, a new capital then only a few years old.

Moktar Ould Daddah, the first Mauritanian to graduate from university, led the country as president until he was overthrown in a military coup in 1978. The country balanced its Arab and African roots, later joining both the Organisation of African Unity and the Arab League.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Mauritania, history ↗
Francisco Xavier do Amaral, who proclaimed East Timor's independence in 1975, photographed in 2007.
Francisco Xavier do Amaral, who proclaimed East Timor’s independence in 1975, photographed in 2007.
Image creditWahlkampf_JRH_mit_Francisco_do_Amaral_u._Mario_Carrascalao.JPG: Jörg Meier, Watch Indonesia! derivative work: Patrick (talk) · CC BY-SA 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
1975

East Timor declares independence from Portugal

As Portugal withdrew from its colonies after its 1974 revolution, the independence movement Fretilin won control of East Timor and on 28 November 1975 declared the Democratic Republic of East Timor, with Francisco Xavier do Amaral as president.

Nine days later Indonesia invaded, and it ruled the territory for 24 years, an occupation in which a large part of the population died. After a UN-run vote in 1999, East Timor became independent in 2002, and Timorese mark 28 November as their Proclamation of Independence Day.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: 1975 invasion of East Timor ↗
♙
PEOPLE

Born Today

Jean-Baptiste Lully
Image creditPaul Mignard · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Born 1632

Jean-Baptiste Lully

Italian-born composer at the court of Louis XIV who created French opera.

William Blake
Image creditThomas Phillips · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Born 1757

William Blake

English poet and painter of Songs of Innocence and of Experience.

Claude Lévi-Strauss
Image creditUNESCO/Michel Ravassard · CC BY 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
Born 1908

Claude Lévi-Strauss

French anthropologist who founded structural anthropology.

Russell Hulse
Image creditENERGY.GOV · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Born 1950

Russell Hulse

American physicist who shared the 1993 Nobel Prize for discovering a binary pulsar.

◉
IDEAS THAT CHANGED THINGS

Firsts, Science & Discoveries

Mariner 4 being prepared for a weight test before its launch, November 1963.
Mariner 4 being prepared for a weight test before its launch, November 1963.
Image creditNASA/JPL · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1964

Mariner 4 sets off to become the first spacecraft to visit Mars

NASA launched Mariner 4 from Cape Kennedy on 28 November 1964, days before the launch window closed. After a flight of 228 days it flew past Mars on 14 July 1965, the first spacecraft to do so successfully.

It sent back 22 photographs, the first close-up pictures of another planet. They showed a cratered, Moon-like surface, ending hopes of finding canals or a thriving world.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: NASA Science: Mariner 4 ↗
♫
MUSIC • FILM • BOOKS • CULTURE

Culture Stories

A brick relief marking the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, photographed in 2003.
A brick relief marking the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, photographed in 2003.
Image creditDeirdre 11:55, 27 February 2007 (UTC) · CC BY-SA 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
1925

The Grand Ole Opry goes on the air

On 28 November 1925 the new Nashville radio station WSM put a fiddler in his seventies, Uncle Jimmy Thompson, on the air, introduced by the announcer George D. Hay. Listeners wrote in asking for more, and Hay turned it into a weekly show of local string bands, the WSM Barn Dance.

Renamed the Grand Ole Opry in 1927, it became one of the longest-running radio programmes in the United States and the most famous stage in country music.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Tennessee Encyclopedia (Tennessee Historical Society): Grand Ole Opry ↗
✦
LIVES REMEMBERED

Remembered Today

Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Image creditGian Lorenzo Bernini · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Died 1680

Gian Lorenzo Bernini

Italian sculptor and architect of Baroque Rome, who designed the colonnade of St Peter’s Square.

☉
AROUND THE WORLD

Observances & Anniversaries

Crowds at Vlorë celebrate the first anniversary of Albania's declaration of independence, 28 November 1913.
Crowds at Vlorë celebrate the first anniversary of Albania’s declaration of independence, 28 November 1913.
Image creditPetro Dhimitri · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Annual

Flag Day and Independence Day in Albania

On 28 November 1912, with Serbian, Montenegrin and Greek armies occupying their lands, 83 Albanian delegates met at Vlorë and their leader Ismail Qemali proclaimed Albania independent of the Ottoman Empire. Albanians celebrate the day, which is also Flag Day, with the red flag and black double-headed eagle.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Vlorë proclamation ↗
HISTORY & TIMELINE

Finished the highlights?

Follow 28 November chronologically, from the Middle Ages to the modern day, with 9 verified events and the sources behind them.

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