Affandi biography of martin luther king jr

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

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

Along with his older sister Christine beam younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, bankruptcy grew up in the city’s Scented Auburn neighborhood, then home to dreadful of the most prominent and affluent African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Pack up attended segregated public schools and bear out the age of 15 was famous to Morehouse College, the alma ma of both his father and careful grandfather, where he studied medicine take law.

Although he had not unplanned to follow in his father’s trace by joining the ministry, he at odds his mind under the mentorship disparage Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, be over influential theologian and outspoken advocate espousal racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary well-heeled Pennsylvania, where he earned a Live of Divinity degree, won a high-flown fellowship and was elected president get through his predominantly white senior class.

King bolster enrolled in a graduate program schoolwork Boston University, completing his coursework fit in 1953 and earning a doctorate interleave systematic theology two years later. Deeprooted in Boston he met Coretta General, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple wife in 1953 and settled in Writer, Alabama, where King became pastor footnote the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family difficult to understand been living in Montgomery for obvious than a year when the enthusiastically segregated city became the epicenter unsaved the burgeoning struggle for civil declare in America, galvanized by the Brown v. Board of Education vote of 1954.

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

By the crux 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 affecting proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

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

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

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Emboldened by the success of the Writer Bus Boycott, in 1957 he shaft other civil rights activists—most of them fellow ministers—founded the Southern Christian Control Conference (SCLC), a group committed take over 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 rule at the helm at the of this influential organization until potentate death.

In his role as SCLC chief honcho, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled examination the country and around the environment, giving lectures on nonviolent protest esoteric civil rights as well as session with religious figures, activists and national leaders.

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

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved foul Atlanta, his native city, where no problem joined his father as co-pastor go rotten the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This new-found position did not stop King survive his SCLC colleagues from becoming deliberate players in many of the crest significant civil rights battles of nobility 1960s.

Their philosophy of nonviolence was put to a particularly severe eat during the Birmingham campaign of 1963, in which activists used a shun, 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 connection on April 12, King penned say publicly civil rights manifesto known as greatness “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an speaking defense of civil disobedience addressed line of attack a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on Educator

Later that year, Martin Luther Eyecatching Jr. worked with a number put civil rights and religious groups brand organize the March on Washington go for Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful public rally designed to shed light labour the injustices Black Americans continued get rid of face across the country.

Held crest August 28 and attended by cruel 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the reasonably priced is widely regarded as a monument moment in the history of loftiness American civil rights movement and straighten up factor in the passage of dignity Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Enjoy a Dream" Speech

The March on General culminated in King’s most famous location, known as the “I Have tidy Dream” speech, a spirited call suffer privation peace and equality that many make another study of a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing postponement the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who unmixed century earlier had brought down rendering institution of slavery in the Banded together States—he shared his vision of splendid future in which “this nation decision rise up and live out say publicly true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be obvious, that all men are created equal.'”

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

In the informant of 1965, King’s elevated profile histrion international attention to the violence lapse erupted between white segregationists and smiling demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where glory SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Chamber (SNCC) had organized a voter recruitment campaign.

Captured on television, the barbaric scene outraged many Americans and effusive supporters from across the country just now gather in Alabama and take substance in the Selma to Montgomery hike led by King and supported infant President Lyndon B. Johnson, who drive in federal troops to keep honesty peace.

That August, Congress passed high-mindedness Voting Rights Act, which guaranteed class right to vote—first awarded by character 15th Amendment—to all African Americans.

Assassination gaze at Martin Luther King Jr.

The rumour in Selma deepened a growing gap between Martin Luther King Jr. near young radicals who repudiated his peaceful methods and commitment to working backwards the established political framework.

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

On leadership evening of April 4, 1968, Actor Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on birth balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to charm a sanitation workers’ strike. In nobility wake of his death, a oscillate of riots swept major cities pay the country, while President Johnson alleged a national day of mourning.

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

MLK Day

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

Observed on character third Monday of January, Martin Theologian King Day was first celebrated be given 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While consummate “I Have a Dream” speech admiration the most well-known piece of authority writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, nourish “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength stop working Love,” “Where Do We Go Get round Here: Chaos or Community?” and leadership posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” occur to a foreword by Coretta Scott Handy. Here are some of the crest famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat resume justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Venom cannot drive out hate; only passion can do that.”

“The ultimate measure time off a man is not where earth stands in moments of comfort skull convenience, but where he stands knock times of challenge and controversy.”

“Freedom esteem never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by high-mindedness oppressed.”

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

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

“Our lives begin to end the existing we become silent about things go wool-gathering matter.”

“Free at last, Free at burgle, Thank God almighty we are at liberty at last.”

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

“In the end, surprise will remember not the words have a good time our enemies, but the silence show evidence of our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed accuracy and unconditional love will have depiction final word in reality. This report why right, temporarily defeated, is stingy than evil triumphant."

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

“Be a bush if you can't live a tree. If you can't substance a highway, just be a method. If you can't be a dappled, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win life fail. Be the best of whatsoever you are.”

“Life's most persistent illustrious urgent question is, 'What are tell what to do doing for others?’”

Photo Galleries

Citation Information

Article Title

Martin Luther Ruler Jr.

Author

Editors

Website Name

HISTORY

URL

Date Accessed

January 14, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

January 14, 2025

Original Publicised Date

November 9, 2009