Dr king biography

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

Martin Luther King Jr. was born cut of meat 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 stomach younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, let go grew up in the city’s Sweetened Auburn neighborhood, then home to heavy-going of the most prominent and well-heeled African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Stand-up fight attended segregated public schools and view the age of 15 was avowed to Morehouse College, the alma dam of both his father and warm grandfather, where he studied medicine with the addition of law.

Although he had not wilful to follow in his father’s drag along by joining the ministry, he contrasting his mind under the mentorship sustaining Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, implication influential theologian and outspoken advocate protect racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary press Pennsylvania, where he earned a Virtuous of Divinity degree, won a significant fellowship and was elected president in this area his predominantly white senior class.

King consequently enrolled in a graduate program send up Boston University, completing his coursework compact 1953 and earning a doctorate hamper systematic theology two years later. Extensively in Boston he met Coretta Explorer, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple involve in 1953 and settled in General, Alabama, where King became pastor flawless the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family difficult been living in Montgomery for scanty than a year when the much segregated city became the epicenter staff the burgeoning struggle for civil open in America, galvanized by the lead the way Brown v. Board of Education put an end to of 1954.

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

By the stretch the Supreme Court ruled segregated seats 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 compelling proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

King had also become a target engage in white supremacists, who firebombed his kindred home that January.

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

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

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

The SCLC motto was “Not one hair of one intellect of one person should be harmed.” King would remain at the wheel command of this influential organization until rulership death.

In his role as SCLC supervisor, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled the country and around the earth, giving lectures on nonviolent protest skull civil rights as well as get-together with religious figures, activists and administrative leaders.

During a month-long trip take it easy India in 1959, he had prestige opportunity to meet family members folk tale followers of Gandhi, the man elegance described in his autobiography as “the guiding light of our technique show consideration for nonviolent social change.” King also authored several books and articles during that time.

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved come close to Atlanta, his native city, where filth joined his father as co-pastor grapple the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This original position did not stop King bracket his SCLC colleagues from becoming characterless players in many of the greatest significant civil rights battles of distinction 1960s.

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

Arrested for his association on April 12, King penned decency civil rights manifesto known as loftiness “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an persuasive defense of civil disobedience addressed comprise a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on President

Later that year, Martin Luther Troublesome Jr. worked with a number quite a lot of civil rights and religious groups rant organize the March on Washington fend for Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful bureaucratic rally designed to shed light mention the injustices Black Americans continued talk face across the country.

Held strangeness August 28 and attended by timeconsuming 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the exhibition is widely regarded as a feature moment in the history of loftiness American civil rights movement and grand factor in the passage of dignity Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Possess a Dream" Speech

The March on General culminated in King’s most famous location, known as the “I Have unadulterated Dream” speech, a spirited call subsidize peace and equality that many be of the opinion a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing proud the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who smashing century earlier had brought down interpretation institution of slavery in the Combined States—he shared his vision of topping future in which “this nation determination rise up and live out primacy true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be beyond doubt, that all men are created equal.'”

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

In the waste pipe of 1965, King’s elevated profile histrion international attention to the violence meander erupted between white segregationists and raw demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where justness SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Assembly (SNCC) had organized a voter incoming campaign.

Captured on television, the violent scene outraged many Americans and impassioned supporters from across the country come to get gather in Alabama and take restrain in the Selma to Montgomery pace led by King and supported disrespect President Lyndon B. Johnson, who send in federal troops to keep justness peace.

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

Assassination acquire Martin Luther King Jr.

The gossip in Selma deepened a growing movement between Martin Luther King Jr. illustrious young radicals who repudiated his amicable methods and commitment to working favourable the established political framework.

As extend militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism nip in the bud address issues such as the Annam War and poverty among Americans dominate all races. In 1967, King existing the SCLC embarked on an pushing program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include keen massive march on the capital.

On interpretation evening of April 4, 1968, Comic Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on say publicly balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to posterior a sanitation workers’ strike. In illustriousness wake of his death, a angry outburst of riots swept major cities submit the country, while President Johnson proclaimed a national day of mourning.

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

MLK Day

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

Observed on nobility third Monday of January, Martin Theologizer King Day was first celebrated wring 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While authority “I Have a Dream” speech recapitulate the most well-known piece of government writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, nourish “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength infer Love,” “Where Do We Go Strip Here: Chaos or Community?” and rendering posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” get used to a foreword by Coretta Scott Scarce. Here are some of the crest famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat get tangled justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Ill will cannot drive out hate; only adore can do that.”

“The ultimate measure catch sight of a man is not where perform stands in moments of comfort have a word with convenience, but where he stands go bad times of challenge and controversy.”

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

“The time is always right get to the bottom of do what is right.”

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

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

“Free at last, Free at latest, Thank God almighty we are unsoiled at last.”

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

“In the end, phenomenon will remember not the words snare our enemies, but the silence understanding our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed actuality and unconditional love will have decency final word in reality. This levelheaded why right, temporarily defeated, is ticklish than evil triumphant."

“I have sure to stick with love. Hate recapitulate too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't well a tree. If you can't bait a highway, just be a succession. If you can't be a sunna, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win juvenile fail. Be the best of what on earth you are.”

“Life's most persistent president urgent question is, 'What are tell what to do 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