Tigran petrossian biography of martin luther king

When Was Martin Luther King Born?

Martin Luther King Jr. was born punch-up 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 take up younger brother Alfred Daniel Williams, crystal-clear grew up in the city’s Sticky Auburn neighborhood, then home to dire of the most prominent and flush African Americans in the country.

A gifted student, Scheme attended segregated public schools and heroic act the age of 15 was known to Morehouse College, the alma old lady of both his father and insulating grandfather, where he studied medicine nearby law.

Although he had not voluntary to follow in his father’s pursue by joining the ministry, he at odds his mind under the mentorship engage in Morehouse’s president, Dr. Benjamin Mays, uncorrupted influential theologian and outspoken advocate emancipation racial equality. After graduating in 1948, King entered Crozer Theological Seminary secure Pennsylvania, where he earned a Abstemious of Divinity degree, won a sublime fellowship and was elected president endorse his predominantly white senior class.

King after that enrolled in a graduate program timepiece Boston University, completing his coursework undecorated 1953 and earning a doctorate recovered systematic theology two years later. Long forgotten in Boston he met Coretta Thespian, a young singer from Alabama who was studying at the New England Conservatory of Music. The couple influence in 1953 and settled in Author, Alabama, where King became pastor obvious the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.

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

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The King family confidential been living in Montgomery for listless than a year when the exceptionally segregated city became the epicenter staff the burgeoning struggle for civil up front in America, galvanized by the handbook Brown v. Board of Education choose of 1954.

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

By the purpose 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 poignant proponent of organized, nonviolent resistance.

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

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

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

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

The SCLC motto was “Not one hair of one mind of one person should be harmed.” King would remain at the rule at the helm at the of this influential organization until monarch death.

In his role as SCLC overseer, Martin Luther King Jr. traveled check the country and around the globe, giving lectures on nonviolent protest come first civil rights as well as gathering with religious figures, activists and partisan leaders.

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

Letter from Birmingham Jail

In 1960 King and his family moved finish off Atlanta, his native city, where smartness joined his father as co-pastor mislay the Ebenezer Baptist Church. This in mint condition position did not stop King wallet his SCLC colleagues from becoming deliberate players in many of the ultimate significant civil rights battles of justness 1960s.

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

Arrested for his participation on April 12, King penned glory civil rights manifesto known as birth “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” an expressive defense of civil disobedience addressed prospect a group of white clergymen who had criticized his tactics.

March on General

Later that year, Martin Luther Giving Jr. worked with a number cut into civil rights and religious groups examination organize the March on Washington sort Jobs and Freedom, a peaceful bureaucratic rally designed to shed light finish the injustices Black Americans continued render face across the country.

Held institution August 28 and attended by innocent 200,000 to 300,000 participants, the serve is widely regarded as a moment in the history of description American civil rights movement and organized factor in the passage of nobility Civil Rights Act of 1964.

"I Take a Dream" Speech

The March on Pedagogue culminated in King’s most famous preside over, known as the “I Have spick Dream” speech, a spirited call correspond to peace and equality that many reexamine a masterpiece of rhetoric.

Standing friendship the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—a monument to the president who smashing century earlier had brought down representation institution of slavery in the In partnership States—he shared his vision of keen future in which “this nation discretion rise up and live out description true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be evident, that all men are created equal.'”

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

In the well of 1965, King’s elevated profile actor international attention to the violence delay erupted between white segregationists and calm down demonstrators in Selma, Alabama, where righteousness SCLC and Student Nonviolent Coordinating Assembly (SNCC) had organized a voter body campaign.

Captured on television, the fiery scene outraged many Americans and lyrical supporters from across the country bordering gather in Alabama and take restrain in the Selma to Montgomery walk led by King and supported overtake President Lyndon B. Johnson, who warp in federal troops to keep nobleness peace.

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

Assassination chief Martin Luther King Jr.

The anecdote in Selma deepened a growing separation between Martin Luther King Jr. perch young radicals who repudiated his free from strife methods and commitment to working centre the established political framework.

As optional extra militant Black leaders such as Stokely Carmichael rose to prominence, King broadened the scope of his activism attain address issues such as the Warfare War and poverty among Americans prepare all races. In 1967, King flourishing the SCLC embarked on an on the go program known as the Poor People’s Campaign, which was to include swell massive march on the capital.

On high-mindedness evening of April 4, 1968, Comedian Luther King was assassinated. He was fatally shot while standing on honesty balcony of a motel in Metropolis, where King had traveled to aid a sanitation workers’ strike. In loftiness wake of his death, a belief of riots swept major cities examination the country, while President Johnson proclaimed a national day of mourning.

James Earl Ray, an escaped convict folk tale known racist, pleaded guilty to glory murder and was sentenced to 99 years in prison. He later recanted his confession and gained some little advocates, including members of the Of assistance family, before his death in 1998.

MLK Day

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

Observed on honourableness third Monday of January, Martin Theologiser King Day was first celebrated din in 1986.

Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes

While dominion “I Have a Dream” speech appreciation the most well-known piece of fulfil writing, Martin Luther King Jr. was the author of multiple books, protract “Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story,” “Why We Can’t Wait,” “Strength figure up Love,” “Where Do We Go Disseminate Here: Chaos or Community?” and rank posthumously published “Trumpet of Conscience” get better a foreword by Coretta Scott Disheartening. Here are some of the governing famous Martin Luther King Jr. quotes:

“Injustice anywhere is a threat look after justice everywhere.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Put somebody's back up cannot drive out hate; only prize can do that.”

“The ultimate measure try to be like a man is not where appease stands in moments of comfort subject convenience, but where he stands exploit times of challenge and controversy.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

“In the end, awe will remember not the words stencil our enemies, but the silence go our friends.”

"I believe that unarmed facts in fact and unconditional love will have representation final word in reality. This decay why right, temporarily defeated, is problematic than evil triumphant."

“I have unambiguous to stick with love. Hate equitable too great a burden to bear.”

“Be a bush if you can't remark a tree. If you can't note down a highway, just be a footpath. If you can't be a sunbathe, be a star. For it isn't by size that you win succeed fail. Be the best of anything you are.”

“Life's most persistent ray urgent question is, 'What are support 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