Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was born on 15th January, 1929, in Atlanta Georgia. He was a notable American pastor, humanitarian, activist, and leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for his role in the advancement of civil rights using nonviolent civil disobedience. On October 14, 1964, King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for combating racial inequality through nonviolence.

Childhood

King was born to Reverend Martin Luther King, Sr. and Alberta Williams King. King’s birth name was "Michael King" which was the birth name of his father too. But his father "changed" both names on his own during a 1934 trip to Nazi Germany to attend the Fifth Baptist World Alliance Congress in Berlin. During this trip, in the honor of the German reformer Martin Luther, he chose to be called Martin Luther King.

Education

Martin Luther King Jr had mostly grown up in Atlanta. There he attended Booker T. Washington High School, but being an extra ordinary kid; he skipped both the ninth and the twelfth grades. Later, at only 15, he got enrolled into Morehouse College without formally graduating from high school. He completed his B.A. degree in sociology, and in 1948 entered into Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, from which he graduated with a B.Div. Degree.

Career

At a very early age, Martin Luther King Jr became a civil rights activist. In 1955, he led Montgomery Bus Boycott over the reserved seats for whites, and in 1957, helped founding the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). In 1962, with SCLC, King organized non-violent protests in Birmingham, Alabama and an unsuccessful struggle against segregation in Albany, Georgia. But attracted national attention following television news coverage. In 1963, King led the March on Washington, where he delivered his famous speech "I Have a Dream"; and got his reputation as one of the greatest orators in American history.

In 1965, he organized the Selma to Montgomery marches and later took the movement to Chicago to work on issue of segregated housing. In 1967, Martin Luther King Jr delivered “Beyond Vietnam” in which he criticized America’s instance on the Vietnam War.

At the End

In 1968, King actively organized and promoted “Poor People’s Campaign” to address issues of economic injustice and traveled the country to gather the people for March on Washington.

On April 3rd, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr went to Memphis where he took a rally in support of black sanitary public work employees who had been on strike for higher wages and better treatment over white workers. On the very next day, King was assassinated while he was staying at Lorraine Motel.