Today in Black History: March 28th
1984 – Benjamin Mays, President of Morehouse College, Passes Away
Benjamin Mays was a distinguished African American minister, educator, scholar, social activist and longtime president of Morehouse College in Atlanta. He was also a significant mentor to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and was among the most articulate and outspoken critics of segregation before the rise of the modern civil rights movement in the United States. Mays also filled leadership roles in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the International Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA), the World Council of Churches, the United Negro College Fund, the National Baptist Convention, the Urban League, the Southern Conference for Human Welfare, the Southern Conference Educational Fund, and the Peace Corps Advisory Committee.
In 1940 Mays became the president of Morehouse College. During King’s years as an undergraduate at Morehouse in the mid-1940s, the two developed a close relationship that continued until King’s death in 1968. Mays’s unwavering emphasis on two ideas in particular—the dignity of all human beings and the incompatibility of American democratic ideals with American social practices— became vital strains in the language of King and the civil rights movement. After his retirement in 1967 from Morehouse, Mays remained active in several social and political organizations of prominence and was in demand as a speaker and lecturer. He died on March 28th, 1984.
1949– Track Star Ronnie Ray Smith Is Born
Ronnie Ray Smith, American olympic athlete, was born in Los Angeles California on March 28th, 1949. Ronald Ray Smith was the winner of the gold medal in the 4 × 100 m relay at the 1968 Summer Olympics. He attended San Jose State College during the “Speed City” era, coached by Lloyd (Bud) Winter and graduated in sociology.
At the 1968 AAU Championships, Ronnie Ray Smith equaled the 100 m world record in the semifinal, repeating the same time of 9.9 which was run by Jim Hines in the same race and Charles Greene in the other semifinal of the same competition. At the Mexico Olympics, Smith ran the third leg in the American 4 × 100 m relay team that won the gold medal and set a new world record of 38.24 seconds. After retiring from competitions Smith worked at the Los Angeles Parks and Recreation Department. He was inducted into the San Jose State Sports Hall of Fame. Smith died in a hospice facility in Los Angeles, California, on March 31, 2013. He was 64.
