Havel at Columbia



This Day in The Velvet Revolution, 1989

October 28: Independence Day demonstration in Prague

Anniversary of the foundation of an independent Czechoslovak state in 1918. Police violently suppress some 10,000 demonstrators protesting against the communist regime on Prague's Wenceslas Square. Havel is in hospital because of breathing problems and cannot attend the protest, but his name figures prominently in the crowd's chants.