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Explore 28 September

Explore 28 September: William of Normandy lands in England, Cabrillo sails into San Diego Bay, Guinea votes for independence and Israel and the PLO sign Oslo II. Meet Clemenceau, Lata Mangeshkar and Brigitte Bardot, born on this date.

This day through time →13 verified events across 5 eras

⌛13Full
Timeline ◈6Historic
Moments ♙7Born
Today ✦5Lives
Remembered ◉2Firsts &
Discoveries ☉2Observances
Pevensey Castle from the air. Its outer walls are those of the Roman fort near which William's army came ashore.
Pevensey Castle from the air. Its outer walls are those of the Roman fort near which William’s army came ashore.
Image creditPevensey_Castle_aerial_view.jpg: Lieven Smits derivative work: Hchc2009 (talk) · CC BY-SA 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
1066

William of Normandy lands at Pevensey

Before dawn on 28 September 1066 a Norman fleet of about 700 ships sailed into Pevensey Bay on the Sussex coast and William, Duke of Normandy, landed his army unopposed. It was three days after King Harold had defeated a Norwegian invasion at Stamford Bridge in Yorkshire, far to the north.

Within a few days William had moved east and raised fortifications at Hastings. Harold marched south to meet him, and on 14 October the two armies fought the Battle of Hastings, which left Harold dead and opened the way to the Norman Conquest of England.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: English Heritage: History of Pevensey Castle ↗
The statue of Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo at Cabrillo National Monument, San Diego.
The statue of Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo at Cabrillo National Monument, San Diego.
Image creditThe original uploader was Loki30 at German Wikipedia.(Original text: Wolfgang Artmüller) · CC BY-SA 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
1542

Cabrillo sails into San Diego Bay

On 28 September 1542, 103 days after leaving the port of Navidad in Mexico, ships commanded by Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo entered the bay now called San Diego. They were the first European ships known to have reached the west coast of what is now the United States.

Cabrillo probably went ashore at Ballast Point and claimed the land for Spain, meeting the Kumeyaay people who lived there. Because they arrived close to the feast of St Michael he named the bay San Miguel; it kept that name for sixty years, until Sebastián Vizcaíno renamed it San Diego.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: National Park Service: California, Cabrillo National Monument ↗
Charles de Gaulle, whose return to power in 1958 led to the new constitution.
Charles de Gaulle, whose return to power in 1958 led to the new constitution.
Image creditOffice of War Information, Overseas Picture Division. [1] The image prefix (LC-USW3) at the Library of Congress image page matches that of pictures from the OWI collection (see prefix list here. · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1958

France votes for the Fifth Republic

On 28 September 1958 voters in France and its overseas territories approved the new constitution drawn up after Charles de Gaulle’s return to power. It was carried by 79.25% of the votes, and the Constitution of the Fifth Republic was proclaimed on 4 October 1958.

The new constitution strengthened the executive, giving the president powers to act without a minister’s countersignature, to call referendums and to dissolve the National Assembly. Only Guinea voted no, and it became independent at once, the first of France’s African territories to do so.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Conseil constitutionnel: 18 May - 28 September 1958, the birth of the Constitution of the Fifth Republic ↗
Gamal Abdel Nasser and Shukri al-Quwatli sign the union of Egypt and Syria, February 1958.
Gamal Abdel Nasser and Shukri al-Quwatli sign the union of Egypt and Syria, February 1958.
Image creditUnknown authorUnknown author · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1961

Syria breaks away from the United Arab Republic

On 28 September 1961 Syrian army officers staged a coup in Damascus and took Syria out of the United Arab Republic, the union with Egypt proclaimed on 1 February 1958. The secession met no resistance.

Many Syrians had come to feel sidelined in a state run from Cairo, and decrees in July 1961 that limited landholdings and nationalised banks and businesses deepened the anger. Egypt kept the name United Arab Republic until 1971, the year after President Nasser’s death.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: United Arab Republic ↗
The signature page of the Oslo II agreement, signed in Washington on 28 September 1995.
The signature page of the Oslo II agreement, signed in Washington on 28 September 1995.
Image creditGovernment of Israel and Palestine Liberation Organization · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1995

Israel and the PLO sign the Oslo II agreement

On 28 September 1995 Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization signed the Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, known as Oslo II, in Washington. Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres and Yasser Arafat signed it, witnessed by the United States, Russia, Egypt, Jordan, Norway and the European Union.

It divided the West Bank into Areas A, B and C with different mixes of Palestinian and Israeli control, provided for elections to a Palestinian council and for Israeli forces to withdraw from the main Palestinian towns, and promised talks on the hardest questions, including Jerusalem, refugees and borders, by May 1996. Rabin was assassinated five weeks later.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: UN Peacemaker: Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (Oslo II) ↗
Sékou Touré, Guinea's first president, at the White House in 1962.
Sékou Touré, Guinea’s first president, at the White House in 1962.
Image creditRobert Knudsen. White House Photographs. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1958

Guinea votes for independence

In the referendum of 28 September 1958, France’s African territories were asked whether to join the new French Community set up under the constitution of the Fifth Republic. Guinea, under the influence of the trade union leader Sékou Touré, was the only one to vote no, and it did so overwhelmingly.

Guinea became independent on 2 October 1958, the first French-speaking country in Africa to do so, with Touré as its first president. France’s response was harsh: it withdrew its officials and professionals and removed what equipment it could carry away.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: History of Guinea ↗
♙
PEOPLE

Born Today

Prosper Mérimée
Image creditCharles Reutlinger · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Born 1803

Prosper Mérimée

French writer and historian whose novella Carmen inspired Bizet’s opera, and an early champion of historic monuments.

Georges Clemenceau
Image creditPaul Nadar · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Born 1841

Georges Clemenceau

French prime minister who led the country through the last year of the First World War and at the peace conference.

Marcello Mastroianni
Image creditGorup de Besanez · CC BY-SA 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
Born 1924

Marcello Mastroianni

Italian film star of La Dolce Vita and 8½.

Lata Mangeshkar
Image creditBollywood Hungama · CC BY 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
Born 1929

Lata Mangeshkar

Indian playback singer whose voice was heard in Hindi films for more than seven decades.

Brigitte Bardot
Image creditWilly Pragher · CC BY 4.0Resized and cropped for display.
Born 1934

Brigitte Bardot

French actress and singer who became an international star in the 1950s and later campaigned for animal welfare.

Mika Häkkinen
Image creditSven Mandel · CC BY-SA 4.0Resized and cropped for display.
Born 1968

Mika Häkkinen

Finnish racing driver, Formula One world champion in 1998 and 1999.

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IDEAS THAT CHANGED THINGS

Firsts, Science & Discoveries

A Douglas World Cruiser, the type flown on the 1924 circumnavigation.
A Douglas World Cruiser, the type flown on the 1924 circumnavigation.
Image creditUnknown · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
1924

The first flight around the world ends

On 28 September 1924 two aircraft of the United States Army Air Service landed at Seattle to complete the first flight around the world. Four Douglas World Cruisers, named Seattle, Chicago, Boston and New Orleans, had set out from the same field on 6 April with eight crew.

Only Chicago and New Orleans finished. Seattle crashed into an Alaskan mountainside in fog, and Boston came down in the north Atlantic and was wrecked while being lifted aboard a navy ship; all the crews survived. The journey took 175 days, 371 hours in the air and about 27,550 miles.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum: The story of the first flight around the world ↗
A Falcon 1 lifting off from Omelek Island in the Kwajalein Atoll, 2008.
A Falcon 1 lifting off from Omelek Island in the Kwajalein Atoll, 2008.
Image creditSpaceX · CC BY-SA 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
2008

The first privately built rocket reaches orbit

On 28 September 2008, by the clocks in the United States (29 September on the island itself), a Falcon 1 rocket lifted off from Omelek Island in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific and reached Earth orbit. It was the first privately built liquid-fuelled rocket to do so.

SpaceX, founded six years earlier, had failed three times: the first attempt in 2006 caught fire 25 seconds after lift-off because of a corroded nut. The success kept the company alive and led on to the Falcon 9 rockets that now carry astronauts and satellites.

Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Falcon 1 ↗
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LIVES REMEMBERED

Remembered Today

Louis Pasteur
Image creditPaul Nadar · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Died 1895

Louis Pasteur

French chemist and microbiologist who developed pasteurisation and vaccines against anthrax and rabies.

Edwin Hubble
Image creditJohan Hagemeyer · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Died 1953

Edwin Hubble

American astronomer who showed that there are galaxies beyond our own and that the universe is expanding.

Gamal Abdel Nasser
Image creditStevan Kragujević · CC BY-SA 3.0Resized and cropped for display.
Died 1970

Gamal Abdel Nasser

President of Egypt from 1956 to 1970 and a leading voice of Arab nationalism.

Pope John Paul I
Image creditAnefo · CC0Resized and cropped for display.
Died 1978

Pope John Paul I

Italian pope who died only 33 days after his election.

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AROUND THE WORLD

Observances & Anniversaries

St Wenceslas in an illumination from the Wolfenbüttel manuscript of Gumpold's legend of the saint.
St Wenceslas in an illumination from the Wolfenbüttel manuscript of Gumpold’s legend of the saint.
Image creditUnknown authorUnknown author · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Annual

Czech Statehood Day

Since 2000, 28 September has been a Czech state holiday, Czech Statehood Day. It recalls the killing of Duke Wenceslas of Bohemia on the morning of 28 September 935, attacked on his way to mass by supporters of his brother Boleslav. Wenceslas became the country’s patron saint and a symbol of Czech statehood.

Source: Radio Prague International: 28 September, the day of Czech Statehood and the anniversary of the death of St Wenceslas ↗
Louis Pasteur, photographed by Paul Nadar.
Louis Pasteur, photographed by Paul Nadar.
Image creditPaul Nadar · Public domainResized and cropped for display.
Annual

World Rabies Day

World Rabies Day, marked on 28 September every year since 2007, falls on the anniversary of the death of Louis Pasteur, who developed the first rabies vaccine. It aims to raise awareness of a disease that is deadly but preventable.

Source: World Health Organization: World Rabies Day ↗
HISTORY & TIMELINE

Finished the highlights?

Follow 28 September chronologically, from the Middle Ages to the modern day, with 13 verified events and the sources behind them.

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