On this day, Black Enterprise Founder Earl Graves, Sr. was awarded the NAACP Spingarn Medal in 1999

On this day, the largest slave uprising was scheduled to be carried out. Denmark Vesey, the organizer of the revolt, was caught and hanged two weeks before the plan was executed.

In New York City, protests and rioting erupted over the implementation of a draft for soldiers during the Civil War

Today we celebrate politician David Dinkins on his 93rd birthday! Dinkins was the 106th mayor of New York and the only African American to hold that position.

#OTD Dr. Daniel Hale Williams performed the first successful heart surgery. The procedure was done at his hospital, Provident Hospital and Training School For Nurses, in Chicago, Illinois

Today we shine a spotlight on swing era bandleader Billy Eckstine

#OTD "When Doves Cry" by Prince and the Revolution began a five week chart run at number one on the Billboard Hot 100

Today we celebrate songstress Phyllis Hyman on what would be her 71st birthday.

Today we shine a spotlight on Olympic gold medalist Calvin Smith, dubbed the "fastest man alive" after his record-breaking 100m sprint.

Today we shine a spotlight on the Oblate Sisters of Providence, a Roman-Catholic sisterhood founded by women of African descent in Baltimore, Maryland