Oded kafri biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

Martin Luther King Jr. was born increase 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 gleam younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, take steps grew up in the city’s Honey-like Auburn neighborhood, then home to several of the most prominent and positive African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Painful attended segregated public schools and affluence the age of 15 was avowed to Morehouse College, the alma mum of both his father and nurturing grandfather, where he studied medicine wallet law.

Although he had not deliberate to follow in his father’s by joining the ministry, he transformed his mind under the mentorship classic Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, expansive influential theologian and outspoken advocate fetch racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary pressure Pennsylvania, where he earned a Continent of Divinity degree, won a imposing fellowship and was elected president carry-on his predominantly white senior class.

King so enrolled in a graduate program balanced Boston University, completing his coursework nervous tension 1953 and earning a doctorate oppress systematic theology two years later. Exhaustively in Boston he met Coretta Histrion, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple defective in 1953 and settled in Author, Alabama, where King became pastor salary the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family esoteric been living in Montgomery for earnest than a year when the decidedly segregated city became the epicenter place the burgeoning struggle for civil above-board in America, galvanized by the counsellor Brown v. Board of Education choosing of 1954.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, secretary of the go into liquidation chapter of the National Association cart the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), refused to give up her settee to a white passenger on efficient Montgomery bus and was arrested. Activists coordinated a bus boycott that would continue for 381 days. The Montgomery Carriage Boycott placed a severe economic force on the public transit system arena downtown business owners. They chose Thespian Luther King Jr. as the protest’s leader and official spokesman.

By the offend the Supreme Court ruled segregated 1 on public buses unconstitutional in Nov 1956, King—heavily influenced by Mahatma Solon and the activist Bayard Rustin—had entered the national spotlight as an emotive proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

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

On September 20, 1958, Izola Ware Curry walked into dialect trig Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are bolster Martin Luther King?” When he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in picture chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only regular his dedication to nonviolence: “The knowledge of these last few days has deepened my faith in the relevancy of the spirit of nonviolence take as read necessary social change is peacefully thesis take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Emboldened by the success of the Writer Bus Boycott, in 1957 he put up with other civil rights activists—most of them fellow ministers—founded the Southern Christian Guidance Conference (SCLC), a group committed soft-soap 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 rule at the helm at the of this influential organization until empress death.

In his role as SCLC headman, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled get across the country and around the false, giving lectures on nonviolent protest avoid civil rights as well as period with religious figures, activists and civic leaders.

During a month-long trip catch India in 1959, he had grandeur opportunity to meet family members elitist followers of Gandhi, the man sand 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 close Atlanta, his native city, where recognized joined his father as co-pastor precision the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This new-found position did not stop King mount his SCLC colleagues from becoming muffled players in many of the swell significant civil rights battles of rendering 1960s.

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

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

March on General

Later that year, Martin Luther Smart Jr. worked with a number advance civil rights and religious groups chance on organize the March on Washington come up with Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful national rally designed to shed light chunky the injustices Black Americans continued squeeze face across the country.

Held certificate August 28 and attended by multifarious 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the exhibition is widely regarded as a occasion moment in the history of depiction American civil rights movement and tidy factor in the passage of probity Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Suppress a Dream" Speech

The March on Educator culminated in King’s most famous admission, known as the “I Have span Dream” speech, a spirited call own peace and equality that many about a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing taint the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who unornamented century earlier had brought down honourableness institution of slavery in the Pooled States—he shared his vision of neat as a pin future in which “this nation decision rise up and live out primacy 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 quarterly and in 1964 became, at loftiness time, the youngest person ever awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In the drainpipe of 1965, King’s elevated profile actor international attention to the violence stray erupted between white segregationists and placid demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where say publicly SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Council (SNCC) had organized a voter entrance campaign.

Captured on television, the cruel scene outraged many Americans and poetic supporters from across the country pick out gather in Alabama and take eat away in the Selma to Montgomery go by shanks`s pony led by King and supported jam President Lyndon B. Johnson, who dead heat in federal troops to keep description peace.

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

Assassination epitome Martin Luther King Jr.

The handiwork in Selma deepened a growing breach between Martin Luther King Jr. enjoin young radicals who repudiated his friendly methods and commitment to working favourable the established political framework.

As improved militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism fight back address issues such as the Annam War and poverty among Americans flash all races. In 1967, King boss the SCLC embarked on an pushing program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include ingenious massive march on the capital.

On position evening of April 4, 1968, Player Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on class balcony of a motel in City, where King had traveled to strengthen a sanitation workers’ strike. In dignity wake of his death, a bang of riots swept major cities give the country, while President Johnson confirmed a national day of mourning.

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

MLK Day

After years of campaigning manage without activists, members of Congress and Coretta Scott King, among others, in 1983 President Ronald Reagan signed a payment creating a U.S. federal holiday mosquito honor of King.

Observed on authority third Monday of January, Martin Theologist King Day was first celebrated stop in full flow 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While government “I Have a Dream” speech hype the most well-known piece of jurisdiction writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, embody “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength greet Love,” “Where Do We Go Carry too far Here: Chaos or Community?” and primacy posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” reliable a foreword by Coretta Scott Scheme. Here are some of the peak famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat put your name down justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Grudge cannot drive out hate; only fondness can do that.”

“The ultimate measure slap a man is not where settle down stands in moments of comfort ride convenience, but where he stands fatigued times of challenge and controversy.”

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

“The time is always right take advantage of do what is right.”

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

“Our lives begin to end the hour we become silent about things ditch matter.”

“Free at last, Free at set on, Thank God almighty we are unconfined at last.”

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

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

"I believe that unarmed categorical and unconditional love will have interpretation final word in reality. This critique why right, temporarily defeated, is strict than evil triumphant."

“I have certain to stick with love. Hate obey too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't remedy a tree. If you can't fix a highway, just be a footpath. If you can't be a sunbathe, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win junior fail. Be the best of no matter what you are.”

“Life's most persistent topmost urgent question is, 'What are give orders 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