And another one gone

"We look for breakthroughs, we look for people who have made it, who have succeeded against the odds, who have proven somehow that long shots do come in."

John H. Johnson, 87:

Born Jan. 19, 1918, in Arkansas City, Ark., Johnson moved to Chicago with his family at age 15. After graduating from public schools, Johnson attended the University of Chicago and Northwestern University.

While working at the black-owned Supreme Life Insurance Co., where he started as a clerk, Johnson founded Johnson Publishing Co. in 1942. Its first magazine was Negro Digest, a journal that condensed articles of interest to blacks and published the poems and short stories of black writers.

Johnson used Supreme Life's mailing list to offer discount charter subscriptions of the digest. To persuade a distributor to take the magazine, he got co-workers to ask for it at newsstands on Chicago's South Side. Friends bought most of the copies, convincing dealers the magazine was in demand, while Johnson reimbursed the friends and resold the copies they had bought. The tactic was used in New York, Philadelphia and Detroit, and within a year, Negro Digest was selling 50,000 copies a month. The magazine is no longer published.

Besides his wife, Johnson is survived by a daughter, Linda Johnson Rice, president of Johnson Publishing.