28 May in History

585 B.C.--A solar eclipse occurs, as predicted by Thales, a Greek philosopher and scientist.  It occurs during a battle between Cyaxares and Alyattes, leading to a truce.  This date is one of the cardianl dates from which events in ancient times can be calculated.

1503 A.D.--James IV Stewart, King of Scots, and Margaret Tudor are married per the Papal Bull of Alexander VI.  A Treaty of Everlasting Peace is signed between England and Scotland.  The peace lasts ten years.

1533--Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, declares the marriage between King Henry VIII Tudor and Anne Boleyn to be valid.

1588--The Spanish Armada, consisting of a force of 130 ships and 30000 men, leaves port from Lisbon, Portugal enroute to England.

1754--The French and Indian War.  In the first engagement of the war, the Virginia militia, under Lieutenant Colonel George Washington defeat a French scouting party at the Battle of Jumonville Glen, in what is now Fayette County, Pennsylvania.

1830--President Andrew Jackson signs the Indian Removal Act, paving the way for the Trail of Tears and a genocide of Native Americans.  Native Americans to this day often do not use twenty dollar bills due to his likeness on it.

1859--After being cast, Big Ben is carted to Palace of Westminster from the Whitechapel Bell Foundry.

1892--In San Francisco, California, John Muir organizes the Sierra Club.

1905--Russo-Japanese War.  The Battle of Tsushima Straits concludes with the destruction of the Russian naval forces by the Imperial Japanese Navy under the command of Admiral Togo Heihachiro.

1936--Alan Turing submits On Computable Numbers for publication.

1940--Belgium surrenders to Germany.

1964--The Palestine Liberation Organization is formed.

1982--Falklands War.  The British defeat Argentinian forces at the Battle of Goose Green.

1998--Pakistan responds to Indian nuclear testing by five tests of its own.

1999--In Milan, Italy, Leonardo Da Vinci's The Last Supper is returned to public exhibition after 22 years of restoration work.

2002--The Mars Odyssey finds large deposits of ice on the planet Mars.