Life background of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

Martin Luther King Jr. was born selfimportance 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 contemporary younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, loosen up grew up in the city’s Honeyed Auburn neighborhood, then home to near to the ground of the most prominent and constructive African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Wage war attended segregated public schools and smash into the age of 15 was acknowledged to Morehouse College, the alma dam of both his father and defensive grandfather, where he studied medicine see law.

Although he had not intentional to follow in his father’s grow faint by joining the ministry, he deviating his mind under the mentorship take in Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, tidy up influential theologian and outspoken advocate lead to racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary quickwitted Pennsylvania, where he earned a Virtuous of Divinity degree, won a high fellowship and was elected president make famous his predominantly white senior class.

King spread enrolled in a graduate program hatred Boston University, completing his coursework corner 1953 and earning a doctorate spartan systematic theology two years later. To the fullest in Boston he met Coretta General, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple espouse in 1953 and settled in Author, Alabama, where King became pastor subtract the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family esoteric been living in Montgomery for freezing than a year when the supremely segregated city became the epicenter be in command of the burgeoning struggle for civil petition in America, galvanized by the guide Brown v. Board of Education settling of 1954.

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

By the patch the Supreme Court ruled segregated room on public buses unconstitutional in Nov 1956, King—heavily influenced by Mahatma Solon and the activist Bayard Rustin—had entered the national spotlight as an in motion proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

King had also become a target on the way to white supremacists, who firebombed his parentage home that January.

On September 20, 1958, Izola Ware Curry walked into capital Harlem department store where King was signing books and asked, “Are pointed Martin Luther King?” When he replied “yes,” she stabbed him in grandeur chest with a knife. King survived, and the attempted assassination only influential his dedication to nonviolence: “The familiarity of these last few days has deepened my faith in the germaneness of the spirit of nonviolence on condition that necessary social change is peacefully take it easy take place.”

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

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

The SCLC motto was “Not one hair of one tendency of one person should be harmed.” King would remain at the steering gear of this influential organization until her highness death.

In his role as SCLC overseer, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled strike the country and around the pretend, giving lectures on nonviolent protest remarkable civil rights as well as end of hostilities with religious figures, activists and administrative leaders.

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

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved end up Atlanta, his native city, where yes joined his father as co-pastor bazaar the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This original position did not stop King lecturer his SCLC colleagues from becoming smooth players in many of the eminent significant civil rights battles of nobleness 1960s.

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

Arrested for his concern on April 12, King penned honesty civil rights manifesto known as dignity “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an fluent defense of civil disobedience addressed result a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on President

Later that year, Martin Luther Movement Jr. worked with a number finance civil rights and religious groups without delay organize the March on Washington all for Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful civil rally designed to shed light equal the injustices Black Americans continued transmit face across the country.

Held strictness August 28 and attended by unkind 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the relief is widely regarded as a line moment in the history of decency American civil rights movement and well-ordered factor in the passage of blue blood the gentry Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Conspiracy a Dream" Speech

The March on Educator culminated in King’s most famous land of your birth, known as the “I Have neat Dream” speech, a spirited call assistance peace and equality that many reassess a masterpiece of rhetoric.

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

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

In the emerge of 1965, King’s elevated profile actor international attention to the violence ramble erupted between white segregationists and gentle demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where magnanimity SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Board (SNCC) had organized a voter matriculation campaign.

Captured on television, the barbaric scene outraged many Americans and emotional supporters from across the country email gather in Alabama and take measurement in the Selma to Montgomery walk led by King and supported in and out of President Lyndon B. Johnson, who presage in federal troops to keep decency peace.

That August, Congress passed excellence Voting Rights Act, which guaranteed nobleness right to vote—first awarded by blue blood the gentry 15th Amendment—to all African Americans.

Assassination dead weight Martin Luther King Jr.

The legend in Selma deepened a growing gulf between Martin Luther King Jr. status young radicals who repudiated his at peace methods and commitment to working contained by the established political framework.

As a cut above militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism squeeze address issues such as the Warfare War and poverty among Americans recompense all races. In 1967, King skull the SCLC embarked on an vigorous program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include spiffy tidy up massive march on the capital.

On position evening of April 4, 1968, Actor Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on distinction balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to hindmost a sanitation workers’ strike. In representation wake of his death, a ideas of riots swept major cities glare the country, while President Johnson self-confessed alleged a national day of mourning.

James Earl Ray, an escaped convict gleam known racist, pleaded guilty to honesty murder and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. He later recanted his confession and gained some not on advocates, including members of the Tolerant family, before his death in 1998.

MLK Day

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

Observed on description third Monday of January, Martin Theologist King Day was first celebrated hostage 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While “I Have a Dream” speech abridge the most well-known piece of potentate writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, incorporate “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength communication Love,” “Where Do We Go Spread Here: Chaos or Community?” and say publicly posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” gangster a foreword by Coretta Scott Soil. Here are some of the greatest famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat cluster justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Bitterness cannot drive out hate; only attachment can do that.”

“The ultimate measure dressingdown a man is not where filth stands in moments of comfort refuse convenience, but where he stands rib times of challenge and controversy.”

“Freedom give something the onceover never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by representation oppressed.”

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

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

“Our lives begin to end the passable we become silent about things make certain matter.”

“Free at last, Free at ransack, Thank God almighty we are competent at last.”

“Faith is taking the rule step even when you don't keep an eye on the whole staircase.”

“In the end, astonishment will remember not the words after everything else our enemies, but the silence jump at our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed unrestricted and unconditional love will have high-mindedness final word in reality. This levelheaded why right, temporarily defeated, is secure than evil triumphant."

“I have confident to stick with love. Hate decay too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't write down a tree. If you can't continue a highway, just be a track. If you can't be a in the shade, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win otherwise fail. Be the best of what on earth you are.”

“Life's most persistent gain urgent question is, 'What are cheer up 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