95 things happened on 28 February, from 202 BC to 2026. UK stories come first, then the rest of the world.
1638 · 388 years ago
The National Covenant was formally adopted in Scotland. It was an agreement, signed by many Scottish people, opposing changes that King Charles I was trying to force on the Church of Scotland. The king's plans had already caused protests across the country. T…
UK history first: stories from England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
UK story
The National Covenant was formally adopted in Scotland. It was an agreement, signed by many Scottish people, opposing changes that King Charles I was trying to force on the Church of Scotland. The king's plans had already caused protests across the country. The Covenant spread through most of Scotland, and its supporters became known as Covenanters.
UK story
The United Kingdom recognised Egypt as an independent country, ending its protectorate over Egypt. A protectorate is a country that runs most of its own affairs but lets a more powerful country control things such as its foreign policy and defence. The announcement was called the Unilateral Declaration of Egyptian Independence, because Britain made it on its own.
UK story
At the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, Francis Crick and James Watson worked out the structure of DNA, the molecule that stores genetic information in living things. They showed it is shaped like a spiral called a helix, using X-ray photographs by Rosalind Franklin and Raymond Gosling. That lunchtime, Crick told people in The Eagle pub that they had 'discovered the secret of life'.
UK story
In a general election, Harold Wilson's Labour Party won the most seats but not an overall majority, even though Prime Minister Edward Heath's Conservatives won a bigger share of the votes. This is called a hung parliament, which means no single party has more than half of the MPs. It was the first hung parliament since 1929. The Liberal Party won more votes than ever before.
UK story
Bus drivers in Greater Manchester began an eleven-week strike, one of the longest in British transportation history.
Rebel leader Liu Bang declared himself Emperor Gaozu, founder and first emperor of the Han dynasty. He had overthrown the Qin dynasty, the first imperial dynasty of China. The Qin ruler Ying Zheng had united China in 221 BC and called himself Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China, but the Qin dynasty collapsed in 206 BC.
Indian physicist C. V. Raman and his student K. S. Krishnan discovered that when light passes through a clear material, some of the light that is scattered changes its wavelength. This is now called the Raman effect. In 1930 Raman won the Nobel Prize in Physics, becoming the first Asian person to receive it. India celebrates National Science Day every 28 February to mark his discovery.
An editor noticed that 'dord', listed in Webster's New International Dictionary as meaning 'density', had no explanation of where the word came from. He investigated and found it was a mistake. A note reading 'D or d', meaning the letter D can stand for density, had been misread as one word. 'Dord' had been in the dictionary since 1934 and became a famous 'ghost word'.
Scientists detected GRB 970228, a very bright 80-second flash of gamma rays, a powerful kind of radiation. It was the first gamma-ray burst for which a fading glow, called an afterglow, was also seen. Before this, the positions of these bursts in the sky were very uncertain. The discovery gave early evidence that gamma-ray bursts happen far beyond our own galaxy, the Milky Way.
Pope Benedict XVI stepped down as head of the Catholic Church, as he had announced on 11 February. He was the first pope to give up the office since Gregory XII in 1415. Benedict had been pope since 2005. Afterwards he chose to be known as 'pope emeritus', a title he kept until his death in 2022.
The Fourth Council of Constantinople closes.
Elias Lönnrot signs and dates the foreword to the first version of the Kalevala, the so-called Old Kalevala.
USS Indiana, the lead ship of her class and the first battleship in the United States Navy comparable to foreign battleships of the time, was launched.
Ranavalona III (pictured), the last sovereign ruler of the Kingdom of Madagascar, was deposed by French military forces.
The most successful football club in Portugal, S.L. Benfica (first team pictured), was founded in Lisbon as Sport Lisboa.
In the aftermath of the Balkan Wars, Greeks living in southern Albania proclaimed the short-lived Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus.
The Charlevoix-Kamouraska earthquake strikes northeastern North America.
Discoverer 1, an American spy satellite that is the first object intended to achieve a polar orbit, is launched but fails to achieve orbit.
The 1969 Portugal earthquake hits Portugal, Spain and Morocco.
The final episode of M*A*S*H airs, with almost 110 million viewers.
Space Shuttle Atlantis is launched on STS-36.
A Turkish military memorandum results in the collapse of the coalition government in Turkey.
The 2001 Nisqually earthquake, having a moment magnitude of 6.8, with epicenter in southern Puget Sound, damages the Seattle metropolitan area.
Prime Minister Modi of India inaugurates the 2nd Space Port of India - Kulasekarapattinam Spaceport.
Every answer is somewhere on this page. Have a go, then check!
In which year did this happen: “A general election leaves Britain with a hung parliament”?
A: 1974. 1974 — that’s 52 years ago. Find it on the page
In which year did this happen: “Scots adopt the National Covenant against Charles I's church changes”?
A: 1638. 1638 — that’s 388 years ago. Find it on the page
Which of these happened first?
C: Scots adopt the National Covenant against Charles I's church changes. 1974: A general election leaves Britain with a hung parliament · 1922: Britain recognises Egypt as an independent country · 1638: Scots adopt the National Covenant against Charles I's church changes Find it on the page
“Britain recognises Egypt as an independent country” happened in 1922. How many years ago was that?
A: 104 years. 2026 − 1922 = 104. Find it on the page
Famous people whose birthday is 28 February.
UK story
Peter Medawar was a Brazilian-born British biologist whose discoveries about the body's immune system were key to making tissue and organ transplants work. He studied why the body rejects grafts of tissue, and he shared the 1960 Nobel Prize with the Australian scientist Mac Burnet. He has been called the 'father of transplantation' and was also known for his wit.
Well-known people who died on 28 February.
Festivals, holidays and saints’ days celebrated on 28 February somewhere in the world.
Kalevala Day, also called Finnish Culture Day, celebrates Finland's culture and its national epic poem, the Kalevala. Elias Lönnrot put the Kalevala together from old songs and poems he collected on journeys through Finland and nearby lands, and he dated the foreword of the first version on 28 February 1835. It tells of the creation of the Earth and a magical, wealth-making machine called the Sampo.
Content note: these entries mention things like war, violence, deaths, disasters or crime. They are part of history, but they can be upsetting. Grown-ups and teachers: you may want to read them first. They come straight from Wikipedia and have not been rewritten for children.
Stories with a heading have been written for young readers by A Day in the Past, using the linked articles as sources. Other entries show text from Wikipedia’s “February 28” page and its “On this day” feed, written by Wikipedia contributors and shared under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. Each “Read more” link goes to the article an entry is based on. Photos are credited under each picture. Spotted a mistake? Please tell us.