Did you know about Bill Gates
Following Microsoft's initial public offering in 1986 and the subsequent increase in its stock price, Gates became the world's then-youngest billionaire in 1987, at age 31.
Famous Birthdays on October 28
October 28 has 243 recorded notable births across history, from 1017 to 2006. This focused page highlights 20 people with the strongest available profile context.
1955 — Bill Gates
American businessman and philanthropist, co-founded Microsoft
By thisDay.info Editorial Team · — Wikipedia
Famous Birthdays
243 source records
1017 – 2006
Scorpio
Today in history
Major events on October 28
See what else happened on this day in history.
- 1918 World War I: Czech politicians peacefully take over the city of Prague, thus establishing the First Czechoslovak Republic. Source
- 2018 Jair Bolsonaro is elected president of Brazil with 57 million votes, with Workers' Party candidate Fernando Haddad as the runner-up. It is the first time in 16 years that a Workers' Party candidate is not elected president. Source
Did you know about Gwendoline Christie
Gwendoline Christie is known for portraying Brienne of Tarth in the HBO fantasy-drama series Game of Thrones (2012–2019), and the First Order stormtrooper Captain Phasma in the films Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) and Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017).
Did you know about Andy Richter
Since June 2019, Richter has hosted his own podcast, The Three Questions with Andy Richter, on the Earwolf network.
Did you know about Brad Paisley
Brad Paisley's first success came in 1997 as the writer of David Kersh's "Another You".
Did you know about Finn Wittrock
Finn Wittrock began his career in guest roles on several television shows, while making his film debut in 2004's Halloweentown High and later returning to films in 2010's Twelve.
More major people born on October 28
Notable people are ranked by substantive profile depth and public notability.
1978
Gwendoline Christie
English actress
Gwendoline Tracey Philippa Christie is a British actress. She is known for portraying Brienne of Tarth in the HBO fantasy-drama series Game of Thrones (2012–2019), and the First Order stormtrooper Captain Phasma in the films Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) and Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017). For the former, she received a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series in 2019. Christie has since appeared in the Netflix fantasy series The Sandman and Wednesday, and the Apple TV+ sci-fi thriller series Severance (2025), for which she received a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series nomination in 2025.
1966
Andy Richter
American actor, producer, and screenwriter
Paul Andrew Richter is an American actor, comedian, writer, and talk show announcer. He is best known as the sidekick for Conan O'Brien on O'Brien's talk shows: Late Night, The Tonight Show on NBC, and Conan on TBS. He was also the star of the Fox television series Andy Richter Controls the Universe. He voiced Mort in the Madagascar film franchise and Ben Higgenbottom in the animated television series The Mighty B! on Nickelodeon. Since June 2019, Richter has hosted his own podcast, The Three Questions with Andy Richter, on the Earwolf network. In 2025, Richter played a supporting role in the supernatural horror film Obsession.
1972
Brad Paisley
American singer-songwriter and guitarist
Brad Douglas Paisley is an American country music singer, songwriter, and guitarist. His first success came in 1997 as the writer of David Kersh's "Another You". After this, he signed with Arista Nashville in 1998, and released his debut album Who Needs Pictures in 1999. This was the first of 12 studio albums he released for the label before its closure in 2023, after which he transferred to EMI Nashville. His most commercially successful albums are Mud on the Tires (2003) and Time Well Wasted (2005), both certified double platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America.
1984
Finn Wittrock
American actor
Peter L. "Finn" Wittrock Jr. is an American actor, known for his collaborations with television producer Ryan Murphy. He began his career in guest roles on several television shows, while making his film debut in 2004's Halloweentown High and later returning to films in 2010's Twelve. After studying theater at The Juilliard School, he was a regular in the soap opera All My Children from 2009 to 2011, while performing in several theatrical productions. In 2011, he performed in playwright Tony Kushner's Off-Broadway play The Illusion and made his Broadway debut in 2012 as Happy Loman in the revival of Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman, directed by Mike Nichols.
1837
Tokugawa Yoshinobu
Japanese shōgun (died 1913)
Prince Yoshinobu Tokugawa was a Japanese samurai, daimyo and the 15th and last shōgun of the Tokugawa shogunate. He was part of a movement which aimed to reform the aging shogunate, but was ultimately unsuccessful. He resigned his position as shogun in late 1867, while aiming at keeping some political influence. After these efforts failed following the defeat at the Battle of Toba–Fushimi in early 1868, he went into retirement, and largely avoided the public eye for the rest of his life. Despite his fall from power, he was later raised to a prince, the highest title of nobility in the new Japanese peerage.
1948
Telma Hopkins
American singer and actress
Telma Louise Hopkins is an American actress and pop singer. Hopkins rose to prominence as a member of the pop group Tony Orlando and Dawn, who had several number-one songs. She also performed on the CBS variety show Tony Orlando and Dawn from 1974 until 1976 along with Tony Orlando and Joyce Vincent Wilson. In the late 1970s, Hopkins began working as an actress, playing roles on various sitcoms. In the 1980s-1990s, Hopkins held longer-running sitcom roles as Isabelle Hammond on Bosom Buddies (1980–82), Adelaide "Addy" Wilson on Gimme a Break! (1983–87) and Family Matters (1989–97) as Rachel Baines–Crawford.
1937
Lenny Wilkens
American basketball player and coach (died 2025)
Leonard Randolph Wilkens was an American professional basketball player and coach in the National Basketball Association (NBA). He has been inducted three times into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, first in 1989 as a player, as a coach in 1998, and in 2010 as part of the 1992 United States Olympic "Dream Team" for which he was an assistant coach. In 1996, Wilkens was named to the NBA 50th Anniversary Team, and in 2021 he was named to the NBA 75th Anniversary Team. In addition, in 2022 he was also named to the list of the 15 Greatest Coaches in NBA History, being the only person to be in both NBA 75th anniversary lists as a player and as a coach. He is also a 2006 inductee into the College Basketball Hall of Fame.
1957
Stephen Morris
English drummer
Stephen Paul David Morris is an English musician who is the drummer and percussionist of the rock band New Order and, previously, Joy Division. He also wrote and performed in The Other Two, a band consisting of Morris and his girlfriend and later wife, Gillian Gilbert. Morris also participated in the New Order spin-off band Bad Lieutenant. He and frontman Bernard Sumner are the only two continuous members of New Order, and appeared on every one of the band’s albums. In 2026, Morris was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Joy Division/New Order after two previous nominations.
1943
Jimmy McRae
Scottish race car driver
James Steele McRae is a Scottish former rally driver. He was highly successful in the British Rally Championship, winning the title a record five times in 1981, 1982, 1984, 1987 and 1988 which as of 2023 still stands. In the European Rally Championship for drivers, he was runner-up in 1982, while his highest placing in the World Rally Championship was fifteenth in 1983. McRae runs a plumbing business in his home town of Lanark. He and his wife Margaret had three sons, Colin, Alister and Stuart. Both Colin and Alister were World Rally Championship drivers, with Colin winning the world championship in 1995. McRae's brother-in-law Hugh "Shug" Steele is also a former rally driver.
1880
Billy Wedlock
English footballer (died 1965)
William John Wedlock, also known as "Fatty" or the "India Rubber Man", was an English footballer who played for Bristol City in 1900–01 and from 1905 until his retirement in 1921. Between 1901 and 1905 he played for Aberdare. He was a centre-half whose short and stout stature belied his natural talent. He won 26 England caps between 1907 and 1914, his only rival for the centre-half position being Charlie Roberts of Manchester United, his opposite number in the 1909 FA Cup Final. The East End at Ashton Gate Stadium was named the Wedlock Stand in his honour, before being demolished in 2014 as part of the Ashton Gate Stadium redevelopment. Wedlock's pub opposite the ground was where he lived and worked for 43 years. Folk singer Fred Wedlock was Billy's grandson.
1959
James Keelaghan
Canadian singer-songwriter and producer
James Keelaghan is a Canadian folk singer-songwriter. Born in Calgary, Alberta, Keelaghan is now based in Perth, Ontario. Many of the lyrics in his songs display a concern about social problems and justice in society. Examples of such themes include "Kiri's Piano", about the internment of Japanese Canadians, and "October 70", about the FLQ crisis, inspired by events and figures in Canadian history. Some of his songs concern tragic historical events, such as "Fires of Calais," about the 1940 Dunkirk evacuation of Allied troops during World War II, and "Cold Missouri Waters," about the Mann Gulch fire of 1949. Keelaghan's lilting baritone voice, driving rhythm guitar, and a sense of scene and narrative result in his ability to bridge traditional folk music with roots revival and Celtic music.
1879
Channing H. Cox
American lawyer and politician, 49th Governor of Massachusetts (died 1968)
Channing Harris Cox was an American Republican politician, lawyer, and businessman from Massachusetts. He served as the 49th governor of Massachusetts, from 1921 to 1925. He attended Dartmouth College and served as 47th lieutenant governor to Calvin Coolidge, winning election as governor after Coolidge decided to run for vice president. Cox was noted for advancing progressive labor legislation and adjusting administrative law to Massachusetts' changing economy. He was also the first Massachusetts governor to use radio, when he broadcast live from the Eastern States Exposition on September 19, 1921, at the debut of station WBZ in Springfield.
1991
Lucy Bronze
English footballer
Lucia Roberta Tough Bronze is an English professional footballer who plays as a right-back for Women's Super League club Chelsea and the England women's national team. She has previously played for Sunderland, Everton, Liverpool, Lyon, Manchester City and Barcelona, as well as North Carolina at college level in the United States and Great Britain at the Olympics. Bronze has won a total of five Champions League titles, three with Lyon and two with Barcelona; four Women's Super League titles, with Liverpool, Manchester City and Chelsea; and both the Euro 2022 and the Euro 2025 with England.
1846
Auguste Escoffier
French chef and author (died 1935)
Georges Auguste Escoffier was a French chef, restaurateur and culinary writer who popularised and updated traditional French cooking methods. Much of Escoffier's technique was based on that of Marie-Antoine Carême, one of the codifiers of French haute cuisine; Escoffier's achievement was to simplify and modernise Carême's elaborate and ornate style. In particular, he codified the recipes for the five mother sauces. Referred to by the French press as roi des cuisiniers et cuisinier des rois, Escoffier was a preeminent figure in London and Paris during the 1890s and the early part of the 20th century.
1860
Kanō Jigorō
Japanese martial artist (died 1938)
Kanō Jigorō was a Japanese judoka, educator, politician, and the founder of judo. Judo was one of the first Japanese martial arts to gain widespread international recognition, and the first to become an official Olympic sport since 1964 and 1992, as well as the Commonwealth Games sport in 1990. Pedagogical innovations attributed to Kanō include the use of black and white belts, and the introduction of dan ranking to show the relative ranking among members of a martial-art-style. Well-known mottoes attributed to Kanō include "maximum efficiency minimal effort" and "mutual welfare and benefit" .
1942
Terence Donovan
English-Australian actor (died 2026)
Terence Patrick Donovan was an Australian actor of stage, television and film. Donovan is perhaps known to audiences for his roles in the Australian police dramas Division 4 and Cop Shop, as well as his roles in the soap operas Home and Away as Al Simpson and Neighbours as patriarch Doug Willis. His film roles include Money Movers, Breaker Morant and The Man from Snowy River. He had guest roles in numerous serials including Prisoner, Sons and Daughters, A Country Practice and E Street. He was the father of actor and singer Jason Donovan.
1897
Hans Speidel
German general (died 1984)
Hans Speidel was a German general who successively served in the armies of the German Empire, Nazi Germany and West Germany. The first general officer of the Bundeswehr, he was a key player in West German rearmament during the Cold War as well as West Germany's integration into NATO and international negotiations on European and Western defence cooperation in the 1950s. He served as Commander of the Allied Land Forces Central Europe (COMLANDCENT) from 1957 to 1963 and then as President of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs from 1964.
1939
Miroslav Cerar
Slovenian gymnast and lawyer
Miroslav Cerar is a Yugoslav former artistic gymnast and lawyer of Slovene ethnicity who won the pommel horse event at the 1964 and 1968 Summer Olympics. He is also a four-time World champion and a ten-time European champion. Domestically, Cerar won 13 national all-around titles and was chosen eight times as Yugoslavia's Athlete of the Year. He was awarded the Silver Olympic Order by the International Olympic Committee. He is a co-founder of the Olympic Committee of Slovenia and a member of the executive committee of the European Fair Play Movement.
1967
Kevin Macdonald
Scottish director, producer, and screenwriter
Kevin Macdonald is a Scottish film director. His films include One Day in September (1999), a documentary about the 1972 murder of 11 Israeli athletes, which won him the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, the climbing documentary Touching the Void (2003), the drama The Last King of Scotland (2006), the political thriller State of Play (2009), the Bob Marley documentary Marley (2012), the post-apocalyptic drama How I Live Now (2013), the thriller Black Sea (2014), the Whitney Houston documentary Whitney (2018), and the legal drama film The Mauritanian (2021).