Martin Luther King, Jr.

President Lyndon B. Johnson declared April 7 a national day of mourning for the civil rights leader.

At the White House Rose Garden on November 2, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed a bill creating a federal holiday to honor King. Observed for the first time on January 20, 1986, it is called Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

On January 17, 2000, for the first time, Martin Luther

King Jr. Day was officially observed in all fifty U.S. states.

On the third Monday of January,

we honor the memory of

President Reagan

signing the bill

On April 4, 1968, King was assassinated

by escaped convict James Earl Ray, who was

arrested two months later and received life

inprisonment.

Presidential candidate Robert Kennedy gave a short speech to the gathering of supporters informing them of the tragedy and urging them to continue King’s ideal of non-violence. He was assassinated two months later.

Coretta Scott King

at the funeral

Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

1968

In New York City on April 4, 1967, he delivered

a speech titled “Beyond Vietnam”. He spoke strongly against the U.S.’s role in the war, insisting that the U.S. was in Vietnam “to occupy it as an American colony” and calling the U.S. government “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today”.

1967

clergyman, activist, and prominent leader

in the African-American Civil Rights Movement

"Beyond Vietnam" speech

In the following years, King and the SLCL continued to spread their vision of desegregation all over the USA

with great success.

They weren't always welcome. In the slums of west Chicago, their marches were met by thrown bottles, screaming crowds and near riot circumstances.

King, who received several death threats was hit by a brick during one of these marches but continued to lead-on even in the face of personal danger.

1964-66

King, representing SCLC, was among the leaders of the so-called “Big Six” civil rights organizations who were instrumental in the organization of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, which took place on August 28, 1963. It was at this event that King gave his electrifying “I Have A Dream” speech.

More than a quarter million people of diverse ethnicities attended the event, at the time, it was the largest gathering of protesters in Washington’s history.

King’s speech electrified the crowd. It is regarded, along with Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Infamy Speech, as one of the finest speeches in the history of American oratory.

Fragment from the

"I Have A Dream" speech

1963

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

(1869 – 1948)

was the pre-eminent political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement. Pioneering the use of non-violent resistance to tyranny through mass civil disobedience to achieve political and social progress based upon ahimsa, or total nonviolence for which he is internationally renowned.

King was also said to be influenced by Jesus, Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Mays, Hosea Williams, Bayard Rustin, Henry David Thoreau, Howard Thurman and Leo Tolstoy.

Inspired by Gandhi’s success with non-violent activism, King visited Gandhi’s birthplace in India in 1959.

The trip to India affected King in a profound way, deepening his understanding of non-violent resistance and his commitment to America’s struggle for civil rights.

"I Have A Dream" speech

In the same year, King wrote The Measure of A Man, from which the piece What is Man?, an attempt to sketch the optimal political, social, and economic structure of society, is derived.

1959

In 1957, King, Ralph Abernathy, and other civil rights activists founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).

The group was created to harness the moral authority and organizing power of black churches to conduct non-violent protests in the service of civil rights reform.

The Measure of a Man

King on the cover of Time magazine

on Februay 18, 1957.

1957

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white passanger on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, as was habitual at the time. As a result, King helped organize The Montgomery Bus Boycott.

For 385 days, local African-Americans avoided public transport, causing a critical decrease in public transport revenues.

The situation became so tense that King’s house was bombed and he was also arrested at one point. In the end however, the United States District Court ruled to end racial segregation on all Montgomery public buses.

SLCL founded

King and Rosa Parks

1955

He became pastor of the

Dexter Avenue Baptist Church

in Montgomery, Alabama,

when he was

twenty-five years old.

Montgomery Bus Boycott

King married Coretta Scott

on June 18, 1953

1954

They had four children;

Yolanda King,

Martin Luther King III,

Dexter Scott King,

and Bernice King.

1953

Martin Luther King, Jr.

was born on January 15, 1929,

in Atlanta, Georgia.

His original name was “Michael King, Jr.,” until the family traveled to Europe in 1934 and visited Germany. His father soon changed both of their names in honor of the German Protestant leader Martin Luther.

(1483 - 1546)

was a German priest, professor of theology

and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation.

He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money.

Luther in 1533 by

Lucas Cranach the Elder

King's childhood home

1929

Sources

Interesting Facts About Martin Luther King, Jr.

10, January 2010 article on itTHING by Limoge

http://itthing.com/interesting-facts-about-martin-luther-king-jr

and corresponding Wikipedia articles