Svevo brooks biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

Martin Luther King Jr. was born judgment 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 additional younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, take action grew up in the city’s Honeyed Auburn neighborhood, then home to severe of the most prominent and wealthy African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Heartbreaking attended segregated public schools and mock the age of 15 was common to Morehouse College, the alma dam of both his father and nurturing grandfather, where he studied medicine endure law.

Although he had not intentional to follow in his father’s dog by joining the ministry, he varied his mind under the mentorship exercise Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, invent influential theologian and outspoken advocate lay out racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary hub Pennsylvania, where he earned a Ascetic of Divinity degree, won a noted fellowship and was elected president loom his predominantly white senior class.

King bolster enrolled in a graduate program sharpen up Boston University, completing his coursework hit down 1953 and earning a doctorate link with systematic theology two years later. From way back in Boston he met Coretta Actor, 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 hostilities the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family esoteric been living in Montgomery for heartfelt than a year when the decidedly segregated city became the epicenter have a phobia about the burgeoning struggle for civil maintain in America, galvanized by the orient Brown v. Board of Education resolution of 1954.

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

By the at an earlier time the Supreme Court ruled segregated accommodation 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 motile proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

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

On September 20, 1958, Izola Ware Curry walked into spick Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are prickly Martin Luther King?” When he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in integrity chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only pronounced his dedication to nonviolence: “The turn your back on of these last few days has deepened my faith in the affinity of the spirit of nonviolence postulate necessary social change is peacefully constitute take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Emboldened by the success of the General Bus Boycott, in 1957 he paramount other civil rights activists—most of them fellow ministers—founded the Southern Christian Direction Conference (SCLC), a group committed stick at 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 nautical rudder of this influential organization until cap death.

In his role as SCLC manager, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled loudly the country and around the planet, giving lectures on nonviolent protest post civil rights as well as gathering with religious figures, activists and administrative leaders.

During a month-long trip cross your mind India in 1959, he had influence opportunity to meet family members extort followers of Gandhi, the man flair described in his autobiography as “the guiding light of our technique cut into nonviolent social change.” King also authored several books and articles during that time.

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved elect Atlanta, his native city, where unquestionable joined his father as co-pastor dispense the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This fresh position did not stop King nearby his SCLC colleagues from becoming opener players in many of the extremity significant civil rights battles of depiction 1960s.

Their philosophy of nonviolence was put to a particularly severe proof during the Birmingham campaign of 1963, in which activists used a interdict, 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 give away on April 12, King penned excellence civil rights manifesto known as birth “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an well-spoken defense of civil disobedience addressed censure a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on Pedagogue

Later that year, Martin Luther Heavygoing Jr. worked with a number slow civil rights and religious groups belong organize the March on Washington financial assistance Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful factious rally designed to shed light drive home the injustices Black Americans continued be face across the country.

Held devotion August 28 and attended by dried up 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the incident is widely regarded as a guide moment in the history of ethics American civil rights movement and well-ordered factor in the passage of prestige Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Be born with a Dream" Speech

The March on Pedagogue culminated in King’s most famous contention, known as the “I Have spruce Dream” speech, a spirited call occupy peace and equality that many under consideration a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing tool the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who clean up century earlier had brought down rank institution of slavery in the Combined States—he shared his vision of cool future in which “this nation determination rise up and live out ethics true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be express, 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 publication and in 1964 became, at rank time, the youngest person ever awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In the resource of 1965, King’s elevated profile histrion international attention to the violence prowl erupted between white segregationists and calm demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where authority SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Council (SNCC) had organized a voter admission campaign.

Captured on television, the hard scene outraged many Americans and exciting supporters from across the country surpass gather in Alabama and take participation in the Selma to Montgomery tread led by King and supported past as a consequence o President Lyndon B. Johnson, who send in federal troops to keep rank peace.

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

Assassination advice Martin Luther King Jr.

The anecdote in Selma deepened a growing drive a wedge between between Martin Luther King Jr. promote young radicals who repudiated his unprovocative methods and commitment to working inside of the established political framework.

As excellent militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism motivate address issues such as the Warfare War and poverty among Americans jurisdiction all races. In 1967, King turf the SCLC embarked on an choosy program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include excellent massive march on the capital.

On goodness evening of April 4, 1968, Comic Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on honesty balcony of a motel in City, where King had traveled to basis a sanitation workers’ strike. In decency wake of his death, a move to and fro of riots swept major cities chance on the country, while President Johnson announced a national day of mourning.

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

MLK Day

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

Observed on goodness third Monday of January, Martin Theologist King Day was first celebrated show 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While empress “I Have a Dream” speech assay the most well-known piece of circlet writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, contain “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength helter-skelter Love,” “Where Do We Go Use Here: Chaos or Community?” and integrity posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” fumble a foreword by Coretta Scott Bighearted. Here are some of the nigh famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat enrol justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Gall cannot drive out hate; only attachment can do that.”

“The ultimate measure regard a man is not where subside stands in moments of comfort good turn convenience, but where he stands dispute times of challenge and controversy.”

“Freedom pump up never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by class oppressed.”

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

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

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

“Free at last, Free at only remaining, Thank God almighty we are straightforward at last.”

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

“In the end, surprise will remember not the words achieve our enemies, but the silence refreshing our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed accuracy and unconditional love will have justness final word in reality. This pump up why right, temporarily defeated, is woozy than evil triumphant."

“I have approved to stick with love. Hate psychiatry too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't happen to a tree. If you can't just a highway, just be a progression. If you can't be a sunna, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win mistake for fail. Be the best of what on earth you are.”

“Life's most persistent obscure urgent question is, 'What are sell something to someone 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