Events from the year 1928 in the United States
Incumbents Federal government President: Calvin Coolidge (R-Massachusetts) Vice President: Charles G. Dawes (R-Illinois) Chief Justice: William Howard Taft (Ohio) Speaker of the House of Representatives: Nicholas Longworth (R-Ohio) Senate Majority Leader: Charles Curtis (R-Kansas) Congress: 70th
State governments Governors and lieutenant governors Governors
Lieutenant governors
Events
January January 12 – Mariticide Ruth Snyder is executed at Sing Sing in Ossining, New York. A surreptitious press photograph is taken of her at the moment of electrocution. January 13 – Californian serial killer and rapist Earle Nelson is executed in Winnipeg. He murdered 21 woman and a boy across the United States and Canada in 1926–27.50 Years Before Ted Bundy, Earle Nelson Was The Most Prolific Serial Killer In American History. January 16 – 6th Pan-American Conference opens in Havana. Calvin Coolidge becomes the last sitting U.S. president until 2016 to visit Cuba. January 17 – Huey P. Long wins the 1928 Louisiana Democratic gubernatorial primary. He would win the gubernatorial election later.
February February 8 – British inventor John Logie Baird broadcasts a transatlantic television signal from London to Hartsdale, New York. Extract from The New York Times 1928-02-09. February 25 – Charles Jenkins Laboratories of Washington, D.C. becomes the first holder of a television license from the Federal Radio Commission.
March March 12 – In California, the St. Francis Dam north of Los Angeles fails, killing 400. March 21 – Charles Lindbergh is presented the Medal of Honor for his first trans-Atlantic flight.
April April 10 – "Pineapple Primary": The Republican Party primary elections in Chicago are preceded by assassinations and bombings. April 28 – Tamiami Trail linking Tampa and Miami officially opens to traffic.
May May 10 – The first regular schedule of television programming begins in Schenectady, New York, by the General Electric's television station W2XB (the station is popularly known as WGY Television, after its sister radio station WGY). May 15 – The animated short Plane Crazy is released by Disney Studios in Los Angeles, featuring the first appearances of Mickey and Minnie Mouse. May 19 – Mather Mine disaster: an underground explosion in a Pennsylvania coal mine kills 195 men. May 26 – Airplane Coaster roller coaster opens at Playland, Rye, New York. May 29 – Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad Co., a leading case in United States tort law on the question of liability to an unforeseeable plaintiff, is decided in the New York Court of Appeals.
June June 3 – Serial killer Albert Fish kidnaps and kills 10-year-old Grace Budd in New York. June 4 – Olmstead v. United States decided in the Supreme Court: wiretapped private telephone conversations, obtained by federal agents without judicial approval and subsequently used as evidence, do not violate the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution. June 17 – Aviator Amelia Earhart starts her attempt to become the first woman to successfully cross the Atlantic Ocean. Wilmer Stultz is the pilot. June 29 – Governor of New York (state) Al Smith becomes the first Catholic nominated by a major political party for President of the United States, at the Democratic National Convention in Houston, Texas. June 29 – Outerbridge Crossing and Goethals Bridge, linking Staten Island and New Jersey, are opened.
July July 4 – Jean Lussier goes over Niagara Falls in a rubber ball. July 6 – The world's largest hailstone falls in Potter, Nebraska. July 7 – The first machine-sliced, machine-wrapped loaf of bread is sold in Chillicothe, Missouri, using Otto Frederick Rohwedder's technology. July 12 – Mexican aviator Emilio Carranza dies in a solo plane crash in the New Jersey Pine Barrens while returning from a goodwill flight to New York City. July 25 – The United States recalls its troops from China.
August August 9–19 – First Pan-Pacific Women's Conference held at the Punahou Academy in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii. August 16 – Serial killer and rapist Carl Panzram is arrested in Washington, D.C. after murdering at least 21 men. August 22 – Al Smith accepts the Democratic presidential nomination, with WGY/W2XB simulcasting the event on radio and television.
September September 1 – Richard E. Byrd sets out from New York on his first Antarctic expedition, involving two ships and three airplanes. September 11 – Kenmore's WMAK station starts broadcasting in Buffalo, New York. September 16 – The 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane kills at least 2,500 people in Florida.
October October 9 – The New York Yankees defeat the St. Louis Cardinals, 4 games to 0, to win their 3rd World Series Title in baseball. October 12 – An iron lung (negative pressure ventilator and respirator) is used for the first time at the Children's Hospital, Boston. October 19 – William Edward Hickman is executed at San Quentin State Prison, for the 1927 murder of 12-year-old Marion Parker. October 28 – Bandleader Glenn Miller and Helen Burger marry in New York City.
November
November 4 – At Park Central Hotel in Manhattan, Arnold Rothstein, New York City's most notorious gambler, is shot to death over a poker game. November 6 – 1928 United States presidential election: Republican Herbert Hoover wins by a wide margin over Democratic Governor of New York (state) Al Smith. November 17 – The Boston Garden opens in Boston. November 18 – Mickey Mouse appears in Steamboat Willie, the third Mickey Mouse cartoon released, but the first sound film.
December December 5 – Police disperse a Sicilian gangs' meeting in Cleveland. December 21 – The U.S. Congress approves the construction of Boulder Dam, later renamed Hoover Dam.
Undated The Ford River Rouge Complex at Dearborn, Michigan, an automobile plant begun in 1917, is completed as the largest integrated factory in the world. W2XBS, RCA's first television station, is established in New York City. Eliot Ness begins to lead the prohibition unit in Chicago. The Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America ratifies a new revision of the Book of Common Prayer.
Ongoing Lochner era (c. 1897–c. 1937) On the roof gang, group of cryptologists and radiomen during World War II (1928–1941) U.S. occupation of Haiti (1915–1934) Prohibition (1920–1933) Roaring Twenties (1920–1929)
Sport April 14 – New York Rangers win their First Stanley Cup in ice hockey by defeating the Montreal Maroons 3 games to 2. All games have been played at the Montreal Forum. The Rangers become the second US team to win the Stanley Cup and the first since the Seattle Metropolitans in 1918.
Births
January
January 1 – William Henry Draper III, American venture capitalist January 2 Robert Goralski, American journalist (d. 1988) Dan Rostenkowski, American politician (d. 2010) January 5 – Walter Mondale, American politician, 42nd vice president of the United States from 1977 to 1981 (d. 2021) January 6 – George H. Ross, American businessman January 7 – William Peter Blatty, American novelist and screenwriter (d. 2017) January 8 Slade Gorton, American politician (d. 2020) Sander Vanocur, American journalist (d. 2019) January 9 – Judith Krantz, American novelist (d. 2019) January 10 – Philip Levine, American poet (d. 2015) January 11 Mitchell Ryan, American actor (d. 2022) David L. Wolper, American television producer (d. 2010) January 12 – Lloyd Ruby, American race car driver (d. 2009) January 14 – Lauch Faircloth, American politician (d. 2023) January 15 James G. March, American sociologist (d. 2018) Joanne Linville, American actress (d. 2021) January 16 William Kennedy, American author Sidney Kimmel, American businessman, philanthropist and film producer January 20 – Rudy Boesch, American soldier (d. 2019) January 21 – Gene Sharp, American political theorist of nonviolent action (d. 2018) January 22 – Birch Bayh, American politician (d. 2019) January 30 – Harold Prince, American stage producer, director (d. 2019)
February
February 1 – Tom Lantos, American politician (d. 2008) February 5 Andrew Greeley, American Catholic priest, fiction novelist (d. 2013) William J. Larkin Jr., American politician (d. 2019) February 8 – Jack Larson, American actor, producer and playwright (d. 2015) February 9 Frank Frazetta, American illustrator (d. 2010) Roger Mudd, American journalist (d. 2021) February 11 – Conrad Janis, American jazz trombonist and actor (d. 2022)Conrad Janis (1928–2022), Mindy’s dad on “Mork & Mindy” February 15 – Norman Bridwell, American cartoonist (d. 2014) February 17 – Tom Jones, American lyricist (d. 2023) February 18 – John Ostrom, American paleontologist (d. 2005) February 20 Roy Face, American baseball player (d. 2026) Jean Kennedy Smith, American diplomat (d. 2020) Thomas E. Kurtz, computer scientist and educator (d. 2024) February 22 Paul Dooley, American actor Clarence 13X, American religious leader, founder of the Nation of Gods and Earths (d. 1969) February 23 – Ralph Earnhardt, American race car driver (d. 1973) February 26 – Fats Domino, African-American pianist and singer-songwriter (d. 2017)
March
March 3 – Bernice Sandler, American women's rights activist (d. 2019) March 5 – J. Hillis Miller, American literary critic (d. 2021) March 6 Delbert Daisey, American waterfowl wood carver, decoy maker (d. 2017) Dan Towler, American football player (d. 2001) March 7 William Blankenship, American operatic tenor (d. 2017) Martin Davis, American mathematician and computer scientist (d. 2023) March 9 – Keely Smith, American singer (d. 2017) March 10 – James Earl Ray, American assassin (d. 1998) March 12 Edward Albee, American playwright (d. 2016) Ellen Raskin, American author and illustrator (d. 1984) March 14 Frank Borman, American astronaut (d. 2023) Earl Smith, American baseball center fielder (d. 2014) March 15 – Bob Wilber, American clarinetist and saxophonist (d. 2019) March 17 – Barbara Kloka Hackett, American judge (d. 2018) March 18 – Julia Mullock, American-Korean royal (d. 2017) March 19 John Hall Buchanan Jr., American politician (d. 2018) Arthur Cook, American sport shooter (d. 2021) Patrick McGoohan, American-born British-based actor of Irish descent (d. 2009) March 20 E. D. Hirsch, American author, critic and academic Ed Macauley, American basketball player (d. 2011) March 23 – Mark Rydell, American actor, director and producer March 24 Lloyd W. Bailey, faithless elector from North Carolina (d. 2020) Byron Janis, American pianist (d. 2024) Mel Rosen, American track and field coach (d. 2018) March 25 Aubrey Dunn Sr., American politician (d. 2012) Jim Lovell, American astronaut (d. 2025) March 27 – Douglas Applegate, politician (d. 2021) March 29 – Vincent Gigante, American Mafia gangster (d. 2005) March 31 – Lefty Frizzell, American country music performer (d. 1975)
April
April 1 – George Grizzard, American actor (d. 2007) April 2 – Joseph Bernardin, American cardinal (d. 1996) April 3 Don Gibson, American country music singer-songwriter (d. 2003) Kevin Hagen, American actor (d. 2005) Earl Lloyd, African-American basketball player (d. 2015) April 4 – Maya Angelou, African American poet and novelist (d. 2014) April 5 – Tony Williams, American singer (d. 1992) April 6 – James D. Watson, American geneticist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 2025) April 7 James Garner, American actor, producer (d. 2014) Alan J. Pakula, American producer, director (d. 1998) April 8 – Fred Ebb, American composer (d. 2004) April 9 Paul Arizin, American basketball player (d. 2006) Tom Lehrer, American singer-songwriter, satirist, pianist and mathematician (d. 2025) Floyd Spence, American politician (d. 2001) April 11 – Ethel Kennedy, American human-rights campaigner, wife of Robert F. Kennedy (d. 2024)