This Day in History – August 28
Today is the 240th day of 2013. There are 125 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT
1963: 200,000 people participate in a civil rights rally in Washington, DC, where Dr Martin Luther King Jr delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech in front of the Lincoln Memorial.
OTHER EVENTS
1833: British Parliament bans slavery throughout British Empire.
1922: The first radio commercial in United States airs on WEAF in New York City. The 10-minute advertisement was for the Queensboro Realty Co, which paid a fee of US$100.
1928: All-Party Congress at Lucknow, India, votes for dominion status within British Empire.
1947: Legendary bullfighter Manolete is mortally wounded by a bull during a fight in Linares, Spain. He dies the following day at age 30.
1966: About 50,000 persons die from a drought-caused famine on the island of Lombok, east of Bali. The investigating team finds the bodies of 28,467 people.
1973: Earthquake hits
area southwest of Mexico City, killing 500 people and injuring 1,000 others.
1981: John W Hinckley Jr. pleads innocent to charges of attempting to kill US President Ronald Reagan. He is later acquitted by reason of insanity.
1986: Bolivian government imposes nationwide state of siege in response to march to La Paz by about 7,000 miners opposed to closing of mines.
1991: In an international tour, British Prime Minister John Major becomes the first Western leader to visit Moscow since the coup against President Mikhail Gorbachev and to visit China since the 1989 pro-democracy crackdown in Tiananmen Square.
1992: The first four planes carrying US food aid reach Balet Huen, Somalia, as hundreds cheer.
1993: Workers in Nigeria’s key oil industry, air traffic controllers and others launch a strike in a bid to force out the military-backed government.
1996: The United States denies black nationalist leader Louis Farrakhan permission to accept a promised US$1 billion gift from Libya to help American blacks economically and politically.
2001: Women’s rights groups protest the approval of a new law in Chihuahua, Mexico, which provides for reduced sentences for rapes that were “provoked” by the victim.
2003: The University of Michigan unveils a new admissions policy for undergraduate students. The Supreme Court in June had struck down the university’s previous policy, which used a points-based system that favoured minority applicants.
2004: Hicham El Guerrouj becomes the first man in 80 years to win the 1,500 and the 5,000 races at one Olympics, joining Finnish great Paavo Nurmi in the history books.
2007: A devout Muslim, Abdullah Gull, 56, wins Turkey’s presidency after months of confrontation with the secular establishment, promising to be impartial and praising the idea that Islam and the state should be separate.
2009: A coroner rules Michael Jackson’s death was a homicide caused primarily by the powerful anaesthetic propofol and another sedative, increasing the likelihood of criminal charges against the pop star’s doctor.
2010: US and Afghan troops repel attackers wearing American uniforms and suicide vests in a pair of simultaneous assaults before dawn on NATO bases near the Pakistani border, including one where seven CIA employees died in a suicide attack last year.
2012: A woman who let two 8-year-old girls starve in a cellar and helped her paedophile husband carry out horrific abuse of other girls goes from prison to a convent, outraging Belgians who opposed the early release of one of the country’s most despised criminals.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAY
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, German poet and philosopher (1749-1832); Leo Tolstoy, Russian writer (1828-1910); Charles Boyer, French-born actor (1899-1978); Robertson Davies, Canadian novelist (1913-1995); Janet Frame, New Zealand author (1924- 2004); Shania Twain, US country singer (1965-); LeAnn Rimes, US country singer (1982-); Jack Black, actor (1969-).
— AP