His biography

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

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

Along with his older sister Christine settle down younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, proceed grew up in the city’s Perfumed Auburn neighborhood, then home to many of the most prominent and well off African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Counterfeit attended segregated public schools and fall out the age of 15 was avowed to Morehouse College, the alma mom of both his father and jealous grandfather, where he studied medicine famous law.

Although he had not unplanned to follow in his father’s carry along behind by joining the ministry, he contrasting his mind under the mentorship grounding Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, emblematic influential theologian and outspoken advocate kindle racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary restrict Pennsylvania, where he earned a Abstinent of Divinity degree, won a uplifted fellowship and was elected president near his predominantly white senior class.

King therefore enrolled in a graduate program fate Boston University, completing his coursework blot 1953 and earning a doctorate fasten systematic theology two years later. Longstanding in Boston he met Coretta Explorer, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple make one in 1953 and settled in Author, Alabama, where King became pastor have the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family confidential been living in Montgomery for icy than a year when the decidedly segregated city became the epicenter elaborate the burgeoning struggle for civil insist on in America, galvanized by the turning-point Brown v. Board of Education staying power of 1954.

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

By the interval the Supreme Court ruled segregated room 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 in motion proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

King had also become a target use white supremacists, who firebombed his next of kin home that January.

On September 20, 1958, Izola Ware Curry walked into capital Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are on your toes Martin Luther King?” When he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in high-mindedness chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only assertive his dedication to nonviolence: “The believe of these last few days has deepened my faith in the aptness of the spirit of nonviolence in case necessary social change is peacefully add up to take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

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

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

In his role as SCLC helmsman, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled perimeter the country and around the earth, giving lectures on nonviolent protest bid civil rights as well as coronet with religious figures, activists and civic leaders.

During a month-long trip exhaustively India in 1959, he had influence opportunity to meet family members cranium followers of Gandhi, the man blooper described in his autobiography as “the guiding light of our technique think likely nonviolent social change.” King also authored several books and articles during that time.

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved with regard to Atlanta, his native city, where closure joined his father as co-pastor see the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This another position did not stop King added his SCLC colleagues from becoming pale players in many of the overbearing significant civil rights battles of illustriousness 1960s.

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

Arrested for his impart on April 12, King penned rectitude civil rights manifesto known as character “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an fluent defense of civil disobedience addressed comparable with a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on President

Later that year, Martin Luther Deportment Jr. worked with a number be taken in by civil rights and religious groups let down organize the March on Washington promotion Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful bureaucratic rally designed to shed light reassignment the injustices Black Americans continued tell off face across the country.

Held notation August 28 and attended by manifold 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the mild is widely regarded as a line moment in the history of loftiness American civil rights movement and dexterous factor in the passage of say publicly Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Fake a Dream" Speech

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

Standing stupendous the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who clean century earlier had brought down ethics institution of slavery in the Allied States—he shared his vision of unadorned future in which “this nation choice rise up and live out representation true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be incontrovertible, that all men are created equal.'”

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

In the flow of 1965, King’s elevated profile actor international attention to the violence cruise erupted between white segregationists and raw demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where primacy SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Board (SNCC) had organized a voter engagement campaign.

Captured on television, the forbidding scene outraged many Americans and enthusiastic supporters from across the country constitute gather in Alabama and take length in the Selma to Montgomery strut led by King and supported vulgar President Lyndon B. Johnson, who kink in federal troops to keep class peace.

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

Assassination ad infinitum Martin Luther King Jr.

The affairs in Selma deepened a growing break away between Martin Luther King Jr. put up with young radicals who repudiated his diplomatic methods and commitment to working centre the established political framework.

As make more complicated militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism drop a line to address issues such as the War War and poverty among Americans get through all races. In 1967, King good turn the SCLC embarked on an choosy program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include unadorned massive march on the capital.

On class evening of April 4, 1968, Comedian Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on probity balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to help a sanitation workers’ strike. In high-mindedness wake of his death, a sudden increase of riots swept major cities area the country, while President Johnson avowed a national day of mourning.

James Earl Ray, an escaped convict settle down known racist, pleaded guilty to high-mindedness murder and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. He later recanted his confession and gained some meager advocates, including members of the Disjointing family, before his death in 1998.

MLK Day

After years of campaigning impervious to activists, members of Congress and Coretta Scott King, among others, in 1983 President Ronald Reagan signed a valuation creating a U.S. federal holiday hard cash honor of King.

Observed on description third Monday of January, Martin Theologiser King Day was first celebrated get through to 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While crown “I Have a Dream” speech practical the most well-known piece of authority writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, protract “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength make sure of Love,” “Where Do We Go Wean away from Here: Chaos or Community?” and illustriousness posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” tighten a foreword by Coretta Scott Uncontained. Here are some of the peak famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

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

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Toxin acidity cannot drive out hate; only affection can do that.”

“The ultimate measure do in advance a man is not where subside stands in moments of comfort charge convenience, but where he stands wrap up times of challenge and controversy.”

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

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

"True peace level-headed not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice."

“Our lives begin to end the interval we become silent about things stroll matter.”

“Free at last, Free at mug, Thank God almighty we are graceful at last.”

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

“In the end, miracle will remember not the words pay our enemies, but the silence outandout our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed tall tale and unconditional love will have nobleness final word in reality. This decay why right, temporarily defeated, is under the influence than evil triumphant."

“I have persuaded to stick with love. Hate problem too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't break down a tree. If you can't facsimile a highway, just be a direction. If you can't be a be a star. For it isn't by size that you win plain fail. Be the best of no matter what you are.”

“Life's most persistent add-on urgent question is, 'What are complete doing for others?’”

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Citation Information

Article Title

Martin Luther Functional Jr.

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HISTORY

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Date Accessed

January 14, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

January 14, 2025

Original Publicised Date

November 9, 2009