Jazz trumpeter and composer Miles Davis died in Santa Monica, California from complications following a stroke. He was 65.

On this date in 1986, Shirley Ajayi was the first African American given a part on a television show as a psychic! The show lasted for about one year[actually six months] in Chicago, Illinois since the show was seasonal! Shirley started her career the minute her predictions came true!

On this date in 1961, Purlie Victorious, a farce by playwright Ossie Davis, opened on Broadway. This stage play was written by and stars Ossie Davis as Purlie Victorious, a flamboyant, self ordained minister. Along with wife Lutibelle (Ruby Dee), he returns to Georgia to buy an old barn and convert it into a church. He seeks out Captain Cotchipec (Sorrel Booke), the aging plantation owner entrusted with a $500 inheritance left by the preacher’s sister after her death. Lutibelle is talked into posing as a long-lost cousin to get the money quickly from the dying landowner. Lutibelle gets the money from the old man with the help of his sympathetic son Charlie (Alan Alda), who is as liberal and progressive as his father is racially intolerant. Religious hypocrisy, racial bigotry, civil rights issues and the changing Southern society backed by forced integration are subjects in this film.