#OTD Catcher Josh Gibson, the second Negro League player to be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, died of a stroke at the young age of 35.

#OTD Publisher John H. Johnson, founder of Johnson Publishing Company and creator of Ebony and Jet magazines, was born in Arkansas City, AR.

#OTD The television sitcom The Jeffersons, a spin-off of the popular All In The Family, premiered on CBS.

#OTD Physicist Ronald McNair was selected to be a NASA astronaut. He was one of the seven crew members to perish in the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion.

#OTD Students at the University of Minnesota, representing the Afro American Action Committee, staged a sit-in at the main administration building on campus.

#OTD Gene Mitchell Gray became the first African American student to enroll at the University of Tennessee.

#OTD Playwright and best selling novelist Walter Mosley was born in Los Angeles, CA. Happy 70th birthday!

Happy 51st Birthday, Mary J. Blige! The queen of hip-hop/soul was born #OTD in Bronx, NY.

#OTD Chris Smith, aka Daddy Mac, one half of the rap duo Kris Kross, was born in Atlanta, GA.

#OTD The James Weldon Johnson Collection of American Negro Arts and Letters, established by photographer Carl Van Vechten, opened on the campus of Yale University.