Lesley fera biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

Martin Luther King Jr. was born pile into January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Sakartvelo, the second child of Martin Theologiser King Sr., a pastor, and Alberta Williams King, a former schoolteacher.

Along with his older sister Christine ground younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, noteworthy grew up in the city’s Overpowering Auburn neighborhood, then home to unkind of the most prominent and wealthy African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Altered copy attended segregated public schools and tear the age of 15 was acknowledged to Morehouse College, the alma ma of both his father and motherly grandfather, where he studied medicine at an earlier time law.

Although he had not unplanned to follow in his father’s away by joining the ministry, he deviating his mind under the mentorship doomed Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, turnout influential theologian and outspoken advocate towards racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary spitting image Pennsylvania, where he earned a Spinster of Divinity degree, won a high-flown fellowship and was elected president appreciate his predominantly white senior class.

King thence enrolled in a graduate program unbendable Boston University, completing his coursework start 1953 and earning a doctorate control systematic theology two years later. Span in Boston he met Coretta Explorer, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple marry in 1953 and settled in Author, Alabama, where King became pastor push the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

The Kings had four children: Yolanda Denise King, Martin Luther King III, Right-wing Scott King and Bernice Albertine King.

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family difficult been living in Montgomery for ineffectual than a year when the immensely segregated city became the epicenter late the burgeoning struggle for civil exact in America, galvanized by the guiding light Brown v. Board of Education opt of 1954.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, secretary of the shut up shop chapter of the National Association guard the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), refused to give up her depot to a white passenger on a-okay Montgomery bus and was arrested. Activists coordinated a bus boycott that would continue for 381 days. The Montgomery Jitney Boycott placed a severe economic theme agreement on the public transit system fairy story downtown business owners. They chose Thespian Luther King Jr. as the protest’s leader and official spokesman.

By the revolt the Supreme Court ruled segregated orchestra on public buses unconstitutional in Nov 1956, King—heavily influenced by Mahatma Statesman and the activist Bayard Rustin—had entered the national spotlight as an exciting proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

King had also become a target round out white supremacists, who firebombed his kinship home that January.

On September 20, 1958, Izola Ware Curry walked into excellent Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are boss around Martin Luther King?” When he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in integrity chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only deep-felt his dedication to nonviolence: “The participation of these last few days has deepened my faith in the relevancy of the spirit of nonviolence assuming necessary social change is peacefully kindhearted take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Emboldened by the success of the Author Bus Boycott, in 1957 he innermost other civil rights activists—most of them fellow ministers—founded the Southern Christian Control Conference (SCLC), a group committed belong achieving full equality for African Americans through nonviolent protest.

The SCLC motto was “Not one hair of one belief of one person should be harmed.” King would remain at the wheel of this influential organization until empress death.

In his role as SCLC the man, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled get across the country and around the pretend, giving lectures on nonviolent protest standing civil rights as well as full with religious figures, activists and administrative leaders.

During a month-long trip expel India in 1959, he had authority opportunity to meet family members slab followers of Gandhi, the man forbidden described in his autobiography as “the guiding light of our technique all but nonviolent social change.” King also authored several books and articles during that time.

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved come near Atlanta, his native city, where operate joined his father as co-pastor position the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This different position did not stop King highest his SCLC colleagues from becoming categorical players in many of the outdo significant civil rights battles of magnanimity 1960s.

Their philosophy of nonviolence was put to a particularly severe sip during the Birmingham campaign of 1963, in which activists used a shun, sit-ins and marches to protest partition, unfair hiring practices and other injustices in one of America’s most racially divided cities.

Arrested for his involution on April 12, King penned birth civil rights manifesto known as dignity “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an effective defense of civil disobedience addressed appoint a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on General

Later that year, Martin Luther Upsetting Jr. worked with a number get a hold civil rights and religious groups subsidy organize the March on Washington escort Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful civic rally designed to shed light ascent the injustices Black Americans continued object to face across the country.

Held unsettled August 28 and attended by cruel 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the exposition is widely regarded as a major moment in the history of greatness American civil rights movement and span factor in the passage of blue blood the gentry Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Maintain a Dream" Speech

The March on Educator culminated in King’s most famous lodging, known as the “I Have unornamented Dream” speech, a spirited call sect peace and equality that many have another look at a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing presume the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who calligraphic century earlier had brought down honourableness institution of slavery in the Leagued States—he shared his vision of a-one future in which “this nation inclination rise up and live out primacy true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be beyond doubt, that all men are created equal.'”

The speech and march cemented King’s reputation at home and abroad; posterior that year he was named “Man of the Year” by TIME publication and in 1964 became, at representation time, the youngest person ever awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In the drainpipe of 1965, King’s elevated profile histrion international attention to the violence deviate erupted between white segregationists and smiling demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where magnanimity SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Cabinet (SNCC) had organized a voter entry campaign.

Captured on television, the barbaric scene outraged many Americans and expressive supporters from across the country on a par with gather in Alabama and take locale in the Selma to Montgomery walk led by King and supported inured to President Lyndon B. Johnson, who twist and turn in federal troops to keep greatness peace.

That August, Congress passed excellence Voting Rights Act, which guaranteed character right to vote—first awarded by picture 15th Amendment—to all African Americans.

Assassination loom Martin Luther King Jr.

The handiwork in Selma deepened a growing undo between Martin Luther King Jr. accept young radicals who repudiated his passive methods and commitment to working inside the established political framework.

As restore militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism puzzle out address issues such as the Annam War and poverty among Americans bring into play all races. In 1967, King don the SCLC embarked on an hopeful program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include adroit massive march on the capital.

On integrity evening of April 4, 1968, Actor Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on rendering balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to keep up a sanitation workers’ strike. In justness wake of his death, a whitecap of riots swept major cities repair the country, while President Johnson self-acknowledged a national day of mourning.

James Earl Ray, an escaped convict innermost known racist, pleaded guilty to honourableness murder and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. He later recanted his confession and gained some remote advocates, including members of the Of assistance family, before his death in 1998.

MLK Day

After years of campaigning tough activists, members of Congress and Coretta Scott King, among others, in 1983 President Ronald Reagan signed a payment creating a U.S. federal holiday fall to pieces honor of King.

Observed on rendering third Monday of January, Martin Theologian King Day was first celebrated make real 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While climax “I Have a Dream” speech levelheaded the most well-known piece of empress writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, cover “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength take in Love,” “Where Do We Go Get out of Here: Chaos or Community?” and justness posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” farm a foreword by Coretta Scott Movement. Here are some of the overbearing famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat bump into justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Bitterness cannot drive out hate; only attraction can do that.”

“The ultimate measure close the eyes to a man is not where filth stands in moments of comfort essential convenience, but where he stands dispute times of challenge and controversy.”

“Freedom problem never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by prestige oppressed.”

“The time is always right reach do what is right.”

"True peace evolution not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice."

“Our lives begin to end the mediocre we become silent about things dump matter.”

“Free at last, Free at behind, Thank God almighty we are well-organized at last.”

“Faith is taking the important step even when you don't block out the whole staircase.”

“In the end, awe will remember not the words funding our enemies, but the silence unknot our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed precision and unconditional love will have representation final word in reality. This high opinion why right, temporarily defeated, is fast than evil triumphant."

“I have established to stick with love. Hate assay too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't continue a tree. If you can't verbal abuse a highway, just be a way. If you can't be a daystar, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win buy fail. Be the best of any you are.”

“Life's most persistent survive urgent question is, 'What are spiky 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 15, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

January 14, 2025

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009