October 28 in History

The Great and General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony voted 400 pounds on October 28, 1636, to establish a college in Newtowne (later Cambridge). It was the first institution of higher education in English-speaking North America. The school was renamed Harvard College in 1639 after John Harvard, a young minister who bequeathed his library of 400 books and half his estate. The original purpose was to train Congregationalist clergy, but the curriculum quickly expanded to include law, medicine, and the natural sciences. Harvard's early graduates included six signers of the Declaration of Independence. Today it is the wealthiest university in the world, with an endowment exceeding $50 billion, and has educated eight U.S. presidents. The original 400 pounds appropriated by the colony would be worth roughly $80,000 today.

Congress overrode President Wilson's veto on October 28, 1919, passing the Volstead Act, which defined 'intoxicating liquors' as anything containing more than 0.5% alcohol by volume. Beer, wine, and spirits were all banned. The act was the enforcement mechanism for the Eighteenth Amendment, ratified earlier that year. Exceptions were carved out for sacramental wine, medicinal alcohol, and industrial use. Pharmacies did brisk business writing alcohol prescriptions. Churches reported surging demand for communion wine. The law created a vast illegal market. Bootleggers, speakeasies, and organized crime flourished. Al Capone's empire was built on Prohibition-era liquor distribution. By the early 1930s, public opinion had shifted decisively against the experiment. The Twenty-first Amendment repealed Prohibition on December 5, 1933.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 12.82% on October 28, 1929, the worst single-day percentage loss in its history at that point. The crash came four days after Black Thursday's initial panic. Bankers who had propped up the market on Thursday did not intervene on Monday. Margin calls cascaded as brokers demanded cash from investors who had borrowed heavily to buy stocks. Those who couldn't pay saw their shares sold at any price. The following day, Black Tuesday, the Dow fell another 11.73% on record volume of 16.4 million shares. By mid-November, the market had lost 40% of its value. The crash destroyed consumer confidence, wiped out banks, and triggered a contraction in lending that strangled businesses across the country. The Great Depression that followed lasted a decade.

Nikita Khrushchev announced on Radio Moscow on October 28, 1962, that the Soviet Union would dismantle and remove its nuclear missile installations from Cuba. The announcement ended thirteen days of brinkmanship that had brought the world closer to nuclear war than at any point before or since. In exchange, Kennedy publicly pledged not to invade Cuba and secretly agreed to remove American Jupiter missiles from Turkey within six months. The public deal favored Kennedy; the private deal favored Khrushchev. Both leaders faced intense pressure from hardliners in their own governments. The crisis led directly to the installation of the 'hotline' teletype link between Washington and Moscow in 1963, and to the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty signed the same year. Khrushchev was ousted from power two years later.

Constantine's army faced Maxentius at the Milvian Bridge over the Tiber on October 28, 312, outnumbered by perhaps three to one. Ancient sources claim Constantine ordered his soldiers to mark their shields with a Christian symbol after a vision of a cross in the sky with the words 'In hoc signo vinces' (In this sign, conquer). Whether the vision was real, a political calculation, or a later invention remains debated. What is certain: Constantine won decisively. Maxentius drowned in the Tiber when a pontoon bridge collapsed under retreating troops. Constantine became sole ruler of the western Roman Empire. Within a year, he issued the Edict of Milan, legalizing Christianity throughout the empire. Within a generation, Christianity went from a persecuted minority faith to the state religion of Rome.

The siege of La Rochelle lasted 14 months, from September 1627 to October 28, 1628. Cardinal Richelieu built a 1,500-meter sea wall across the harbor to prevent English ships from resupplying the city. The fortification was an engineering feat: constructed on foundations sunk into the harbor floor, it blocked all maritime access. Inside the walls, the population of 27,000 starved. Dogs, cats, horses, leather, and grass were consumed. By the time the city surrendered, fewer than 5,000 inhabitants remained alive. Richelieu allowed the survivors to keep their Protestant faith but stripped the Huguenots of their military and political rights. La Rochelle's fall ended the Huguenots as an independent political force in France and consolidated royal power under Louis XIII, exactly as Richelieu intended.