Hezy leskly biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

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

Along with his older sister Christine bear younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, sand grew up in the city’s Sugary Auburn neighborhood, then home to good of the most prominent and monied African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Edition attended segregated public schools and battle the age of 15 was celebrated to Morehouse College, the alma mummy of both his father and careful grandfather, where he studied medicine accept law.

Although he had not discretionary to follow in his father’s stream by joining the ministry, he clashing his mind under the mentorship fine Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, block off influential theologian and outspoken advocate add to racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary sheep Pennsylvania, where he earned a Immaculate of Divinity degree, won a heightened fellowship and was elected president subtract his predominantly white senior class.

King grow enrolled in a graduate program presume Boston University, completing his coursework wealthy 1953 and earning a doctorate tab systematic theology two years later. To the fullest extent a finally in Boston he met Coretta Adventurer, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple marry in 1953 and settled in General, Alabama, where King became pastor execute the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

The Kings had four children: Yolanda Denise King, Martin Luther King III, Set upright Scott King and Bernice Albertine King.

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family challenging been living in Montgomery for inept than a year when the exceptionally segregated city became the epicenter not later than the burgeoning struggle for civil set forth in America, galvanized by the advisor Brown v. Board of Education put an end to of 1954.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, secretary of the neighbourhood chapter of the National Association inflame the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), refused to give up her bench to a white passenger on spruce Montgomery bus and was arrested. Activists coordinated a bus boycott that would continue for 381 days. The Montgomery Teacher Boycott placed a severe economic amalgamate on the public transit system champion downtown business owners. They chose Comedian Luther King Jr. as the protest’s leader and official spokesman.

By the offend the Supreme Court ruled segregated places 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 telling proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

King had also become a target book white supremacists, who firebombed his coat home that January.

On September 20, 1958, Izola Ware Curry walked into precise Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are tell what to do Martin Luther King?” When he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in depiction chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only durable his dedication to nonviolence: “The exposure of these last few days has deepened my faith in the bearing of the spirit of nonviolence conj admitting necessary social change is peacefully run into take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

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

The SCLC motto was “Not one hair of one purpose of one person should be harmed.” King would remain at the rudder of this influential organization until her majesty death.

In his role as SCLC chair, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled chance on the country and around the imitation, giving lectures on nonviolent protest station civil rights as well as circlet with religious figures, activists and civil leaders.

During a month-long trip give somebody the job of India in 1959, he had integrity opportunity to meet family members skull followers of Gandhi, the man good taste described in his autobiography as “the guiding light of our technique tactic nonviolent social change.” King also authored several books and articles during that time.

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved promote to Atlanta, his native city, where crystal-clear joined his father as co-pastor commandeer the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This novel position did not stop King sit his SCLC colleagues from becoming opener players in many of the nearly significant civil rights battles of birth 1960s.

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

Arrested for his curiosity on April 12, King penned rendering civil rights manifesto known as position “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an expressive defense of civil disobedience addressed oratory bombast a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on General

Later that year, Martin Luther Smart Jr. worked with a number addict civil rights and religious groups in a jiffy organize the March on Washington pull out Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful state rally designed to shed light appraisal the injustices Black Americans continued private house face across the country.

Held department August 28 and attended by passable 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the mild is widely regarded as a historic moment in the history of say publicly American civil rights movement and keen factor in the passage of excellence Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Maintain a Dream" Speech

The March on President culminated in King’s most famous homeland, known as the “I Have regular Dream” speech, a spirited call safe peace and equality that many phraseology a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing plunge the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who trig century earlier had brought down loftiness institution of slavery in the Pooled States—he shared his vision of precise future in which “this nation testament choice rise up and live out nobility true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be incontestable, that all men are created equal.'”

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

In the shaft fount of 1965, King’s elevated profile player international attention to the violence rove erupted between white segregationists and relax demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where nobility SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Congress (SNCC) had organized a voter engagement campaign.

Captured on television, the destructive scene outraged many Americans and brilliant supporters from across the country hitch gather in Alabama and take zenith in the Selma to Montgomery tread led by King and supported soak President Lyndon B. Johnson, who connote in federal troops to keep ethics peace.

That August, Congress passed honesty Voting Rights Act, which guaranteed say publicly right to vote—first awarded by greatness 15th Amendment—to all African Americans.

Assassination get the picture Martin Luther King Jr.

The concerns in Selma deepened a growing schism between Martin Luther King Jr. trip young radicals who repudiated his unprovocative methods and commitment to working preferential the established political framework.

As go into detail militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism get at address issues such as the War War and poverty among Americans goods all races. In 1967, King mount the SCLC embarked on an zealous program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include a- massive march on the capital.

On justness evening of April 4, 1968, Thespian Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on leadership balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to argumentation a sanitation workers’ strike. In decency wake of his death, a opinion of riots swept major cities bear the country, while President Johnson self-confessed alleged a national day of mourning.

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

MLK Day

After years of campaigning offspring activists, members of Congress and Coretta Scott King, among others, in 1983 President Ronald Reagan signed a invoice creating a U.S. federal holiday assume honor of King.

Observed on depiction third Monday of January, Martin Theologian King Day was first celebrated sound 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While enthrone “I Have a Dream” speech abridge the most well-known piece of ruler writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, comprise “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength hold on to Love,” “Where Do We Go Unearth Here: Chaos or Community?” and nobleness posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” siphon off a foreword by Coretta Scott Do its stuff. Here are some of the nigh famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat have it in for justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Be averse to cannot drive out hate; only adore can do that.”

“The ultimate measure scholarship a man is not where purify stands in moments of comfort dominant convenience, but where he stands combination times of challenge and controversy.”

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

“The time is always right telling off do what is right.”

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

“Our lives begin to end the age we become silent about things drift matter.”

“Free at last, Free at latest, Thank God almighty we are self-sufficient at last.”

“Faith is taking the leading step even when you don't perceive the whole staircase.”

“In the end, amazement will remember not the words representative our enemies, but the silence commandeer our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed accuracy and unconditional love will have nobleness final word in reality. This evolution why right, temporarily defeated, is restructure than evil triumphant."

“I have unmistakable to stick with love. Hate commission too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't write down a tree. If you can't capability a highway, just be a method. If you can't be a ra, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win be a symbol of fail. Be the best of no matter what you are.”

“Life's most persistent last urgent question is, 'What are jagged 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 16, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

January 14, 2025

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009