in history

Encyclopædia Britannica presents people and events from this day in history:

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis: Biography of the Day

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Born this day in 1929 was Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, who redefined the role of U.S. first lady with her elegance, charm, and especially her composure after the 1963 assassination of her husband, President John F. Kennedy.

 

Gerard Manley Hopkins: Biography of the Day

Gerard Manley Hopkins

"There was something in all his words and manners which were at once a rebuke and an attraction to all who could only aspire to be like him."

Coventry Patmore on Gerard Manley Hopkins

Gerard Manley Hopkins, born this day in 1844 in Stratford, Essex, England, was a poet, a Jesuit priest, and one of the most individual of Victorian writers. His work was not published in collected form until 1918, but it influenced many leading 20th-century poets.

 

Beginning of World War I: 28 July 1914 - This Day in History

Using the assassination of the Austrian archduke Francis Ferdinand as a pretext to present Serbia with an unacceptable ultimatum, Austria-Hungary declared war on the Slavic country on this day in 1914, sparking World War I.

More Events on this day:

1976: An earthquake in the industrial city of Tangshan, China, killed more than 240,000 people.

1821: Peru declared its independence from Spain.

1794: Maximilien Robespierre, a radical Jacobin leader and one of the principal figures in the French Revolution, was guillotined before a cheering mob on the Place de la Révolution in Paris.

1750: Composer Johann Sebastian Bach died in Leipzig, Germany.

1540: King Henry VIII of England privately married his fifth wife, Catherine Howard.