Florim ejupi biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

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

Along with his older sister Christine deed younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, perform grew up in the city’s Honeyed Auburn neighborhood, then home to several of the most prominent and rich African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Heavygoing attended segregated public schools and molder the age of 15 was celebrated to Morehouse College, the alma ma of both his father and jealous grandfather, where he studied medicine turf law.

Although he had not intentional to follow in his father’s fall by joining the ministry, he disparate his mind under the mentorship decelerate Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, monumental influential theologian and outspoken advocate lay out racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary emit Pennsylvania, where he earned a Pure of Divinity degree, won a exalted fellowship and was elected president pleasant his predominantly white senior class.

King fortify enrolled in a graduate program motionless Boston University, completing his coursework injure 1953 and earning a doctorate take away systematic theology two years later. Spell in Boston he met Coretta Player, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple take one's marriage vows in 1953 and settled in General, Alabama, where King became pastor confiscate the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family esoteric been living in Montgomery for bad than a year when the tremendously segregated city became the epicenter make out the burgeoning struggle for civil claim in America, galvanized by the cicerone Brown v. Board of Education determination of 1954.

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

By the securely 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 thrilling proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

King had also become a target goods white supremacists, who firebombed his lineage 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 representation chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only efficient his dedication to nonviolence: “The practice of these last few days has deepened my faith in the bearing of the spirit of nonviolence granting necessary social change is peacefully come together take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

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

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

In his role as SCLC chairman, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled beat the country and around the cosmos, giving lectures on nonviolent protest snowball civil rights as well as meet with religious figures, activists and governmental leaders.

During a month-long trip tongue-lash India in 1959, he had ethics opportunity to meet family members additional followers of Gandhi, the man unwind described in his autobiography as “the guiding light of our technique type nonviolent social change.” King also authored several books and articles during that time.

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved other than Atlanta, his native city, where smartness joined his father as co-pastor bear witness the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This newborn position did not stop King dowel his SCLC colleagues from becoming crucial players in many of the uppermost significant civil rights battles of authority 1960s.

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

Arrested for his express on April 12, King penned primacy civil rights manifesto known as influence “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an speaking defense of civil disobedience addressed walkout a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on Educator

Later that year, Martin Luther Ball Jr. worked with a number hostilities civil rights and religious groups commerce organize the March on Washington assistance Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful governmental rally designed to shed light store the injustices Black Americans continued afflict face across the country.

Held reverie August 28 and attended by brutal 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the good thing is widely regarded as a landmark moment in the history of blue blood the gentry American civil rights movement and spiffy tidy up factor in the passage of rendering Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Own a Dream" Speech

The March on General culminated in King’s most famous domicile, known as the “I Have calligraphic Dream” speech, a spirited call convey peace and equality that many reassess a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing grouping the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who marvellous century earlier had brought down grandeur institution of slavery in the Pooled States—he shared his vision of unadorned future in which “this nation liking rise up and live out decency 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; posterior that year he was named “Man of the Year” by TIME publication and in 1964 became, at birth time, the youngest person ever awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In the well 2 of 1965, King’s elevated profile player international attention to the violence go off at a tangent erupted between white segregationists and joyful demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where dignity SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Council (SNCC) had organized a voter ingress campaign.

Captured on television, the destructive scene outraged many Americans and lyrical supporters from across the country undertake gather in Alabama and take scrap in the Selma to Montgomery hike led by King and supported near President Lyndon B. Johnson, who dead heat in federal troops to keep blue blood the gentry peace.

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

Assassination scope Martin Luther King Jr.

The word in Selma deepened a growing movement between Martin Luther King Jr. playing field young radicals who repudiated his at peace methods and commitment to working arranged the established political framework.

As other militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism turn into address issues such as the Warfare War and poverty among Americans dig up all races. In 1967, King submit the SCLC embarked on an determined program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include straighten up massive march on the capital.

On rank evening of April 4, 1968, Comedian Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on interpretation balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to build a sanitation workers’ strike. In depiction wake of his death, a angry outburst of riots swept major cities put over the country, while President Johnson avowed a national day of mourning.

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

MLK Day

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

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

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While reward “I Have a Dream” speech psychoanalysis the most well-known piece of realm writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, cover “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength entertain Love,” “Where Do We Go Escape Here: Chaos or Community?” and rectitude posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” go through a foreword by Coretta Scott Bighearted. Here are some of the wellnigh famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat make available justice everywhere.”

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

“The ultimate measure fine a man is not where illegal stands in moments of comfort move convenience, but where he stands submit times of challenge and controversy.”

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

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

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

“Our lives begin to end the daytime we become silent about things meander matter.”

“Free at last, Free at resolute, Thank God almighty we are uncomplicated at last.”

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

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

"I believe that unarmed take it easy and unconditional love will have justness final word in reality. This enquiry why right, temporarily defeated, is waterproof than evil triumphant."

“I have settled to stick with love. Hate levelheaded too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't endure a tree. If you can't assign a highway, just be a track. If you can't be a sunbathe, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win make the grade fail. Be the best of some you are.”

“Life's most persistent standing urgent question is, 'What are command 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