May 28

585 BC – A solar eclipse occurs, as predicted by the Greek scientist Thales, while Alyattes is battling Cyaxares in the Battle of Halys, in modern Turkey, leading to a truce. This is one of the cardinal dates from which other dates can be calculated.

722 – Around 10 years after the moslem invasion and near total conquest of what is now Spain, the inhabitants of the small town of Covadonga led by Pelayo, rout and defeat the moslem forces sent against them. This is considered the first step in the near 800 year long Reconquista of the Iberian peninsula.

1588 – The Spanish Armada, with 130 ships and 30,000 men, sets sail from Lisbon, Portugal, heading for the English Channel.

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

1830 – President Andrew Jackson signs the Indian Removal Act which  forcibly relocates them to Indian Territory – now Oklahoma.

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

1937 – Volkswagen is founded by the German Labor Front under the Nazi Party

1940 – Belgium surrenders to Nazi Germany to end the Battle of Belgium during World War II.

1977 – In Southgate, Kentucky, the Beverly Hills Supper Club is engulfed in fire, killing 165 people inside.

1987 – 18 year old West German pilot, Mathias Rust, evades Soviet Union air defense and lands a private plane in Red Square, Moscow.

1996 – President Clinton’s former business partners in the Whitewater land deal, Jim McDougal and Susan McDougal, and the Governor of Arkansas Jim Guy Tucker, are convicted of fraud.

1999 – After 22 years of restoration work, Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece The Last Supper is put back on display in Milan, Italy

2002 – The last steel girder is removed from the original World Trade Center site. Cleanup duties officially end with closing ceremonies at Ground Zero in Manhattan, New York City.

2016 – Harambe, a gorilla, is shot to death after grabbing a 3 year old boy in his enclosure at the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden.

2017 – Formula One driver Takuma Sato becomes the first Japanese and Asian driver to wins the Indianapolis 500.