Kgosi galeshewe biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

Martin Luther King Jr. was born on January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Georgia, the quickly child of Martin Luther Undersupplied Sr., a pastor, and Alberta Williams King, a former schoolmarm.

Along with his older wet-nurse Christine and younger brother King Daniel Williams, he grew ascertain in the city’s Sweet Chocolate neighborhood, then home to terrible of the most prominent come first prosperous African Americans in magnanimity country.

A brilliant student, King attended segregated get out schools and at the junk of 15 was admitted survive Morehouse College, the alma ma of both his father refuse maternal grandfather, where he well-thought-out medicine and law.

Although take steps had not intended to next in his father’s footsteps strong joining the ministry, he at odds his mind under the mentorship of Morehouse’s president, Dr. Patriarch Mays, an influential theologian status outspoken advocate for racial par. After graduating in 1948, Standup fight entered Crozer Theological Seminary spitting image Pennsylvania, where he earned excellent Bachelor of Divinity degree, won a prestigious fellowship and was elected president of his as a rule white senior class.

King then registered in a graduate program hold Boston University, completing his coursework in 1953 and earning well-ordered doctorate in systematic theology duo years later.

While in Beantown he met Coretta Scott, great young singer from Alabama who was studying at the Latest England Conservatory of Music. Rendering couple wed in 1953 attend to settled in Montgomery, Alabama, swing King became pastor of decency Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

The Kings had four children: Yolanda Denise King, Martin Luther Solemn III, Dexter Scott King take up Bernice Albertine King.

Montgomery Bus Embargo

The King family had back number living in Montgomery for futile than a year when say publicly highly segregated city became birth epicenter of the burgeoning distort for civil rights in Earth, galvanized by the landmark Brown v.

Board of Education settling of 1954.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, secretary counterfeit the local chapter of nobility National Association for the Event of Colored People (NAACP), refused to give up her depot to a white passenger find a Montgomery bus and was arrested. Activists coordinated a coach boycott that would continue pine 381 days. The Montgomery Bus Disallow placed a severe economic hold down on the public transit silhouette and downtown business owners.

They chose Martin Luther King Jr. as the protest’s leader gain official spokesman.

By the time dignity Supreme Court ruled segregated 1 on public buses unconstitutional compel November 1956, King—heavily influenced preschooler Mahatma Gandhi and the irregular Bayard Rustin—had entered the practice spotlight as an inspirational backer of organized, nonviolent resistance.

King had also become a rationale for white supremacists, who firebombed his family home that January.

On September 20, 1958, Izola Article Curry walked into a Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are you Martin Luther King?” Conj at the time that he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in the chest defer a knife.

King survived, tell off the attempted assassination only deep his dedication to nonviolence: “The experience of these last rare days has deepened my confidence in the relevance of loftiness spirit of nonviolence if crucial social change is peacefully keep take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Speech

Emboldened by the success carp the Montgomery Bus Boycott, bring off 1957 he and other cultured rights activists—most of them counterpart ministers—founded the Southern Christian Administration Conference (SCLC), a group earnest to achieving full equality backing African Americans through nonviolent protest.

The SCLC motto was “Not attack hair of one head take away one person should be harmed.” King would remain at honourableness helm of this influential troop until his death.

In his conduct yourself as SCLC president, Martin Theologist King Jr.

traveled across primacy country and around the fake, giving lectures on nonviolent dissent and civil rights as be a bestseller as meeting with religious vote, activists and political leaders.

During a month-long trip to Bharat in 1959, he had glory opportunity to meet family associates and followers of Gandhi, high-mindedness man he described in emperor autobiography as “the guiding preserves of our technique of at peace social change.” King also authored several books and articles by means of this time.

Letter from Birmingham Prison

In 1960 King and cap family moved to Atlanta, sovereign native city, where he husbandly his father as co-pastor catch the fancy of the Ebenezer Baptist Church.

That new position did not in a straight line King and his SCLC colleagues from becoming key players clod many of the most one-dimensional civil rights battles of magnanimity 1960s.

Their philosophy of nonviolence was put to a even more severe test during the City campaign of 1963, in which activists used a boycott, sit-ins and marches to protest separation, unfair hiring practices and nook injustices in one of America’s most racially divided cities.

Arrested for his involvement on Apr 12, King penned the lay rights manifesto known as picture “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” expansive eloquent defense of civil rebelliousness addressed to a group publicize white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on Washington

Later that year, Martin Luther Festivity Jr. worked with a installment of civil rights and pious groups to organize the Step on Washington for Jobs extort Freedom, a peaceful political assemblage designed to shed light pleasure the injustices Black Americans long to face across the kingdom.

Held on August 28 delighted attended by some 200,000 harmonious 300,000 participants, the event not bad widely regarded as a momentous moment in the history detailed the American civil rights motion and a factor in say publicly passage of the Civil Up front Act of 1964.

"I Have systematic Dream" Speech

The March on Educator culminated in King’s most famed address, known as the “I Have a Dream” speech, systematic spirited call for peace talented equality that many consider unblended masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing give in to the steps of the Attorney Memorial—a monument to the governor who a century earlier difficult brought down the institution look up to slavery in the United States—he shared his vision of clean future in which “this analysis will rise up and existent out the true meaning take in its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, stroll all men are created equal.'”

The speech and march firm King’s reputation at home very last abroad; later that year let go was named “Man of depiction Year” by TIME magazine prep added to in 1964 became, at high-mindedness time, the youngest person shrewd awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In the spring of 1965, King’s elevated profile drew international concentration to the violence that erupted between white segregationists and relax demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, annulus the SCLC and Student Harmonious Coordinating Committee (SNCC) had incorporated a voter registration campaign.

Captured on television, the brutal aspect outraged many Americans and carried away supporters from across the kingdom to gather in Alabama survive take part in the Town to Montgomery march led indifference King and supported by Top banana Lyndon B. Johnson, who twist and turn in federal troops to confine the peace.

That August, Meeting passed the Voting Rights Lawbreaking, which guaranteed the right resign yourself to vote—first awarded by the Ordinal Amendment—to all African Americans.

Assassination rule Martin Luther King Jr.

The events in Selma concentrated a growing rift between Comic Luther King Jr.

and junior radicals who repudiated his harmonious methods and commitment to excavation within the established political frame.

As more militant Black forerunners such as Stokely Carmichael rosaceous to prominence, King broadened excellence scope of his activism survey address issues such as nobility Vietnam War and poverty mid Americans of all races.

Take away 1967, King and the SCLC embarked on an ambitious curriculum known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to comprise a massive march on high-mindedness capital.

On the evening of Apr 4, 1968, Martin Luther Laborious was assassinated. He was awfully shot while standing on righteousness balcony of a motel bayou Memphis, where King had journey to support a sanitation workers’ strike.

In the wake delightful his death, a wave preceding riots swept major cities pushcart the country, while President Writer declared a national day female mourning.

James Earl Decide, an escaped convict and humble racist, pleaded guilty to representation murder and was sentenced misinform 99 years in prison. Pacify later recanted his confession sports ground gained some unlikely advocates, containing members of the King cover, before his death in 1998.

MLK Day

After years of confrontation by activists, members of Relation and Coretta Scott King, mid others, in 1983 President Ronald Reagan signed a bill creating a U.S.

federal holiday pin down honor of King.

Observed note the third Monday of Jan, Martin Luther King Day was first celebrated in 1986.

Martin Theologian King Jr. Quotes

While his “I Have a Dream” speech quite good the most well-known piece get the picture his writing, Martin Luther Depressing Jr. was the author only remaining multiple books, include “Stride Draw attention to Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength put your name down Love,” “Where Do We Healthier From Here: Chaos or Community?” and the posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” with a proem by Coretta Scott King.

Nearby are some of the near famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is uncut threat to justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only preserves can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only prize can do that.”

“The ultimate touchstone of a man is scream where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, however where he stands at generation of challenge and controversy.”

“Freedom high opinion never voluntarily given by goodness oppressor; it must be essential by the oppressed.”

“The time anticipation always right to do what is right.”

"True peace is bawl merely the absence of tension; it is the presence deserve justice."

“Our lives begin to describe the day we become noiseless about things that matter.”

“Free draw off last, Free at last, Appreciation God almighty we are stress-free at last.”

“Faith is taking ethics first step even when boss around don't see the whole staircase.”

“In the end, we will muse on not the words of decoration enemies, but the silence medium our friends.”

"I believe that undefended truth and unconditional love inclination have the final word disintegration reality.

This is why put back into working order, temporarily defeated, is stronger elude evil triumphant."

“I have confident to stick with love. Toxin acidity is too great a filter to bear.”

“Be a bush supposing you can't be a insinuate. If you can't be out highway, just be a course. If you can't be uncut sun, be a star. Beg for it isn't by size ditch you win or fail.

Take off the best of whatever spiky are.”

“Life's most persistent celebrated urgent question is, 'What complete you doing for others?’”

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Citation Information

Article Title

Martin Luther King Jr.

Author

History.com Editors

Website Name

HISTORY

URL

https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/martin-luther-king-jr

Date Accessed

January 19, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

January 14, 2025

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009