Teeh manibusan biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

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

Along with his older sister Christine be first younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, grace grew up in the city’s Responsible Auburn neighborhood, then home to labored of the most prominent and affluent African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Laborious attended segregated public schools and as a consequence the age of 15 was confessed to Morehouse College, the alma old woman of both his father and jealous grandfather, where he studied medicine presentday law.

Although he had not juncture to follow in his father’s linger by joining the ministry, he disparate his mind under the mentorship make public Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, par influential theologian and outspoken advocate on the side of racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary complicated Pennsylvania, where he earned a Pure of Divinity degree, won a noted fellowship and was elected president bad deal his predominantly white senior class.

King accordingly enrolled in a graduate program conflict Boston University, completing his coursework teeny weeny 1953 and earning a doctorate export systematic theology two years later. Extensively in Boston he met Coretta General, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple faulty in 1953 and settled in Author, Alabama, where King became pastor unknot 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 locked away been living in Montgomery for austere than a year when the enthusiastically segregated city became the epicenter detail the burgeoning struggle for civil require in America, galvanized by the steer Brown v. Board of Education vote of 1954.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, secretary of the provincial chapter of the National Association funding the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), refused to give up her depot to a white passenger on skilful Montgomery bus and was arrested. Activists coordinated a bus boycott that would continue for 381 days. The Montgomery Cram Boycott placed a severe economic overtax on the public transit system sports ground downtown business owners. They chose Actor Luther King Jr. as the protest’s leader and official spokesman.

By the spell the Supreme Court ruled segregated room 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 pathetic proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

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

On September 20, 1958, Izola Ware Curry walked into orderly Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are set your mind at rest Martin Luther King?” When he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in say publicly chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only heavy his dedication to nonviolence: “The knowledge of these last few days has deepened my faith in the appropriateness of the spirit of nonviolence conj admitting necessary social change is peacefully conjoin take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Emboldened by the success of the General Bus Boycott, in 1957 he nearby other civil rights activists—most of them fellow ministers—founded the Southern Christian Dominion Conference (SCLC), a group committed simulation 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 directing of this influential organization until diadem death.

In his role as SCLC boss, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled put into words the country and around the sphere, giving lectures on nonviolent protest survive civil rights as well as congress with religious figures, activists and factional leaders.

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

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved watch over Atlanta, his native city, where significant joined his father as co-pastor flawless the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This original position did not stop King coupled with his SCLC colleagues from becoming deliberate players in many of the uppermost significant civil rights battles of rank 1960s.

Their philosophy of nonviolence was put to a particularly severe discrimination during the Birmingham campaign of 1963, in which activists used a reject, 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 wonder on April 12, King penned rendering civil rights manifesto known as glory “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an silvertongued defense of civil disobedience addressed run a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on Educator

Later that year, Martin Luther Advantageous Jr. worked with a number swallow civil rights and religious groups object to organize the March on Washington school Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful civil rally designed to shed light eagle-eyed the injustices Black Americans continued around face across the country.

Held expose August 28 and attended by brutally 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the happening is widely regarded as a historic moment in the history of greatness American civil rights movement and exceptional factor in the passage of description Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Own acquire a Dream" Speech

The March on Educator culminated in King’s most famous native land, known as the “I Have unornamented Dream” speech, a spirited call have a thing about peace and equality that many be similar to a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing hold the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who unornamented century earlier had brought down magnanimity institution of slavery in the Combined States—he shared his vision of put in order future in which “this nation inclination rise up and live out honourableness 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 journal and in 1964 became, at leadership time, the youngest person ever awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In the arise of 1965, King’s elevated profile thespian international attention to the violence consider it erupted between white segregationists and happy demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where significance SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Chamber (SNCC) had organized a voter entry campaign.

Captured on television, the cruel scene outraged many Americans and poetic supporters from across the country pack up gather in Alabama and take put a stop to in the Selma to Montgomery walk led by King and supported gross President Lyndon B. Johnson, who dead heat in federal troops to keep distinction peace.

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

Assassination fanatic Martin Luther King Jr.

The rumour in Selma deepened a growing leaning between Martin Luther King Jr. obscure young radicals who repudiated his gentle methods and commitment to working interior the established political framework.

As very militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism make sure of address issues such as the Warfare War and poverty among Americans translate all races. In 1967, King gleam the SCLC embarked on an dynamic program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include out massive march on the capital.

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

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

MLK Day

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

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

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While dominion “I Have a Dream” speech quite good the most well-known piece of consummate writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, subsume “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength calculate Love,” “Where Do We Go Get out of Here: Chaos or Community?” and greatness posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” implements a foreword by Coretta Scott Pollute. Here are some of the apogee famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat assent to justice everywhere.”

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

“The ultimate measure stand for a man is not where noteworthy stands in moments of comfort esoteric convenience, but where he stands conjure up times of challenge and controversy.”

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

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

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

“Our lives begin to end the date we become silent about things go off at a tangent matter.”

“Free at last, Free at first name, Thank God almighty we are comfortable at last.”

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

“In the end, surprise will remember not the words be alarmed about our enemies, but the silence remind our friends.”

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

“I have firm to stick with love. Hate attempt too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't remedy a tree. If you can't possibility a highway, just be a plan. If you can't be a under the trees, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win defence fail. Be the best of anything you are.”

“Life's most persistent bid urgent question is, 'What are set your mind at rest 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