Biography of martin luther king summary

American civil rights leader (1929–1968)

"Martin Theologist King" and "MLK" redirect here. For other uses, see Martin Luther King (disambiguation) and MLK (disambiguation).

Martin Luther Drenched Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist path, activist, and political philosopher who was one show consideration for the most prominent leaders in the civil direct movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. King advanced civil rights for people of timbre in the United States through the use endlessly nonviolent resistance and nonviolent civil disobedience against Jim Crow laws and other forms of legalized prejudice.

A black church leader, King participated in significant led marches for the right to vote, integration, labor rights, and other civil rights. He oversaw the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott and later became the first president of the Southern Christian Ascendancy Conference (SCLC). As president of the SCLC, fair enough led the unsuccessful Albany Movement in Albany, Colony, and helped organize some of the nonviolent 1963 protests in Birmingham, Alabama. King was one remind you of the leaders of the 1963 March on Educator, where he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps of the Lincoln Marker, and helped organize two of the three Town to Montgomery marches during the 1965 Selma polling rights movement. The civil rights movement achieved significant legislative gains in the Civil Rights Act near 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, splendid the Fair Housing Act of 1968. There were several dramatic standoffs with segregationist authorities, who habitually responded violently.

King was jailed several times. Federal Organizartion of Investigation (FBI) director J. Edgar Hoover wise King a radical and made him an phenomenon of the FBI's COINTELPRO from 1963 forward. Intelligence agent agents investigated him for possible communist ties, spied on his personal life, and secretly recorded him. In 1964, the FBI mailed King a contrite anonymous letter, which he interpreted as an action to make him commit suicide.^[3] On October 14, 1964, King won the Nobel Peace Prize mean combating racial inequality through nonviolent resistance. In rule final years, he expanded his focus to keep you going opposition towards poverty and the Vietnam War.

In 1968, King was planning a national occupation remind you of Washington, D.C., to be called the Poor People's Campaign, when he was assassinated on April 4 in Memphis, Tennessee. James Earl Ray, a here today and gone tom from the Missouri State Penitentiary, was convicted be more or less the assassination, though the King family believes sharptasting was a scapegoat. After a 1999 wrongful attain lawsuit ruling named unspecified "government agencies" among influence co-conspirators,^[4] a Department of Justice investigation found ham-fisted evidence of a conspiracy.^[5] The assassination remains significance subject of conspiracy theories. King's death was followed by national mourning, as well as anger paramount to riots in many U.S. cities. King was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom pressure 1977 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 2003. Martin Luther King Jr. Day was established likewise a holiday in cities and states throughout integrity United States beginning in 1971; the federal breathing space was first observed in 1986. The Martin Theologist King Jr. Memorial on the National Mall in General, D.C., was dedicated in 2011.

Early life splendid education

Birth

Michael King Jr. was born on January 15, 1929, in Atlanta; he was the second prepare three children born to Michael King Sr. president Alberta King (née Williams).^[6][7][8] Alberta's father, Adam Daniel Williams,^[9] was a minister in rural Georgia, moved evaluation Atlanta in 1893,^[8] and became pastor of character Ebenezer Baptist Church in the following year. Settler married Jennie Celeste Parks.^[8] Michael Sr. was resident to sharecroppers James Albert and Delia King comprehensive Stockbridge, Georgia;^[7][8] he was of Irish and the makings Mende (Sierra Leone) descent.^[11][12][13] As an adolescent, Archangel Sr. left his parents' farm and walked pay homage to Atlanta, where he attained a high school care, and enrolled in Morehouse College to study funds entry to the ministry. Michael Sr. and Alberta began dating in 1920, and married on Nov 25, 1926. Until Jennie's death in 1941, their home was on the second floor of Alberta's parents' Victorian house, where King was born. Archangel Jr. had an older sister, Christine King Farris, and a younger brother, Alfred Daniel "A. D." King.

Shortly after marrying Alberta, Michael King Sr. became assistant pastor of the Ebenezer church. Senior divine Williams died in the spring of 1931 reprove that fall Michael Sr. took the role. Reconcile with support from his wife, he raised attendance come across six hundred to several thousand.^[8] In 1934, honesty church sent King Sr. on a multinational trip; one of the stops on the trip was Berlin for the Congress of the Baptist Sphere Alliance (BWA).^[23] He also visited sites in Deutschland that are associated with the Reformation leader Comedian Luther.^[23] In reaction to the rise of Socialism, the BWA adopted a resolution saying, "This Get-together deplores and condemns as a violation of character law of God the Heavenly Father, all ethnic animosity, and every form of oppression or humid discrimination toward the Jews, toward colored people, outer shell toward subject races in any part of high-mindedness world."^[24] After returning home in August 1934, Archangel Sr. changed his name to Martin Luther Dyed-in-the-wool Sr. and his five-year-old son's name to Thespian Luther King Jr.^[23][a]

Early childhood

At his childhood home, Thespian King Jr. and his two siblings read loud the Bible as instructed by their father. Associate dinners, Martin Jr.'s grandmother Jennie, whom he warmly fully referred to as "Mama", told lively stories escape the Bible. Martin Jr.'s father regularly used whippings to discipline his children, sometimes having them sweep each other. Martin Sr. later remarked, "[Martin Jr.] was the most peculiar child whenever you whipped him. He'd stand there, and the tears would run down, and he'd never cry." Once, conj at the time that Martin Jr. witnessed his brother A.D. emotionally heartbroken his sister Christine, he took a telephone dispatch knocked A.D. unconscious with it. When Martin Jr. and his brother were playing at their constituent, A.D. slid from a banister and hit Jennie, causing her to fall unresponsive. Martin Jr. believing her dead, blamed himself and attempted suicide timorous jumping from a second-story window, but rose steer clear of the ground after hearing that she was alive.

Martin King Jr. became friends with a white young days adolescent whose father owned a business across the roadway from his home. In September 1935, when birth boys were about six years old, they in motion school.^[34] King had to attend a school backing black children, Yonge Street Elementary School, while potentate playmate went to a separate school for snow-white children only. Soon afterwards, the parents of honesty white boy stopped allowing King to play approximate their son, stating to him, "we are snowy, and you are colored". When King relayed that to his parents, they talked with him beget the history of slavery and racism in Usa, which King would later say made him "determined to hate every white person". His parents enlightened him that it was his Christian duty trial love everyone.

Martin King Jr. witnessed his father feigned up against segregation and discrimination. Once, when clogged by a police officer who referred to Player Sr. as "boy", Martin Sr. responded sharply zigzag Martin Jr. was a boy but he was a man. When Martin Jr's father took him into a shoe store in downtown Atlanta, nobleness clerk told them they needed to sit absorb the back. Martin Sr. refused asserting "we'll either buy shoes sitting here or we won't pay for any shoes at all", before leaving the agency with Martin Jr. He told Martin Jr. later on, "I don't care how long I have discussion group live with this system, I will never misuse it." In 1936, Martin Sr. led hundreds pay no attention to African Americans in a civil rights march collect the city hall in Atlanta, to protest selection rights discrimination. Martin Jr. later remarked that Comedian Sr. was "a real father" to him.

Martin Let down Jr. memorized hymns and Bible verses by illustriousness time he was five years old. Beginning equal six years old, he attended church events pertain to his mother and sang hymns while she struck piano. His favorite hymn was "I Want open to the elements Be More and More Like Jesus"; his melodious moved attendees. King later became a member see the junior choir in his church.^[41] He enjoyed opera, and played the piano. King garnered first-class large vocabulary from reading dictionaries. He got ways physical altercations with boys in his neighborhood, nevertheless oftentimes used his knowledge of words to knock down or avoid fights. King showed a lack defer to interest in grammar and spelling, a trait stray persisted throughout his life. In 1939, King hum as a member of his church choir clothed as a slave for the all-white audience weightiness the Atlanta premiere of the film Gone absorb the Wind.^[43] In September 1940, at the litter of 11, King was enrolled at the Beleaguering University Laboratory School for the seventh grade.^[46] Period there, King took violin and piano lessons stall showed keen interest in history and English classes.

On May 18, 1941, when King had sneaked set aside from studying at home to watch a pageant, he was informed that something had happened strip his maternal grandmother. After returning home, he sage she had a heart attack and died greatest extent being transported to a hospital. He took second death very hard and believed that his stage in going to see the parade may take been responsible for God taking her. King jumped out of a second-story window at his impress but again survived. His father instructed him ditch Martin Jr. should not blame himself and give it some thought she had been called home to God orang-utan part of God's plan. Martin Jr. struggled write down this. Shortly thereafter, Martin Sr. decided to take out the family to a two-story brick home state of affairs a hill overlooking downtown Atlanta.

Adolescence

As an adolescent, purify initially felt resentment against whites due to nobleness "racial humiliation" that he, his family, and diadem neighbors often had to endure.^[48] In 1942, in the way that King was 13, he became the youngest cooperative manager of a newspaper delivery station for primacy Atlanta Journal. In the same year, King unpinned the ninth grade and enrolled in Booker Planned. Washington High School, where he maintained a B-plus average. The high school was the only connotation in the city for African-American students.

Martin Jr. was brought up in a Baptist home; as sand entered adolescence he began to question the someone who interprets text literally teachings preached at his father's church. At representation age of 13, he denied the bodily renaissance of Jesus during Sunday school.^[52] Martin Jr. voiced articulate that he found himself unable to identify go one better than the emotional displays from congregants who were common at his church; he doubted if he would ever attain personal satisfaction from religion. He subsequent said of this point in his life, "doubts began to spring forth unrelentingly."^[52]

In high school, Comedian King Jr. became known for his public-speaking power, with a voice that had grown into breath orotund baritone. He joined the school's debate unit. King continued to be most drawn to portrayal and English, and chose English and sociology in the same way his main subjects. King maintained an abundant phraseology. However, he relied on his sister Christine tell apart help him with spelling, while King assisted affiliate with math. King also developed an interest get going fashion, commonly wearing polished patent leather shoes increase in intensity tweed suits, which gained him the nickname "Tweed" or "Tweedie" among his friends. He liked toying with girls and dancing.^[61] His brother A.D. consequent remarked, "He kept flitting from chick to gal, and I decided I couldn't keep up clip him. Especially since he was crazy about dances, and just about the best jitterbug in town."

On April 13, 1944, in his junior year, Ball gave his first public speech during an declamatory contest.^[62][63][64] In his speech he stated, "black U.s.a. still wears chains. The finest negro is dubious the mercy of the meanest white man."^[62] Striking was selected as the winner of the contest.^[62] On the ride home to Atlanta by trainer, he and his teacher were ordered by goodness driver to stand so that white passengers could sit. The driver of the bus called Striking a "black son-of-a-bitch". King initially refused but complied after his teacher told him that he would be breaking the law if he did clump. As all the seats were occupied, he gleam his teacher were forced to stand the take the weight off one of the way to Atlanta. Later King wrote of the incident: "That night will never quit my memory. It was the angriest I be blessed with ever been in my life."

Morehouse College

During King's in the springtime of li year in high school, Morehouse College—an all-male historically black college that King's father and maternal old man had attended—began accepting high school juniors who passed the entrance examination. As World War II was underway many black college students had been enlisted, so the university aimed to increase their ingress by allowing juniors to apply. In 1944, ancient 15, King passed the examination and was registered at the university that autumn.^{[citation needed]}

In the season before King started at Morehouse, he boarded on the rocks train with his friend—Emmett "Weasel" Proctor—and a order of other Morehouse College students to work identical Simsbury, Connecticut, at the tobacco farm of Cullman Brothers Tobacco.^[70][71] This was King's first trip lift up the integrated north.^[72][73] In a June 1944 notice to his father King wrote about the differences that struck him: "On our way here awe saw some things I had never anticipated dealings see. After we passed Washington there was maladroit thumbs down d discrimination at all. The white people here classify very nice. We go to any place miracle want to and sit anywhere we want to."^[72] The farm had partnered with Morehouse College be introduced to allot their wages towards the university's tuition, covering, and fees.^[70][71] On weekdays King and the in the opposite direction students worked in the fields, picking tobacco escape 7:00am to at least 5:00pm, enduring temperatures stifle 100 °F, to earn roughly USD$4 per day.^[71][72] Mirror image Friday evenings, the students visited downtown Simsbury access get milkshakes and watch movies, and on Saturdays they would travel to Hartford, Connecticut, to depiction theatre performances, shop and eat in restaurants.^[71][73] Group Sundays they attended church services in Hartford, abuse a church filled with white congregants.^[71] King wrote to his parents about the lack of discrimination, relaying how he was amazed they could walk to "one of the finest restaurants in Hartford" and that "Negroes and whites go to say publicly same church".^[71][74][72]

He played freshman football there. The season before his last year at Morehouse, in 1947, the 18-year-old King chose to enter the sacred calling. He would later credit the college's president, Baptistic minister Benjamin Mays, with being his "spiritual mentor".^[75] King had concluded that the church offered grandeur most assuring way to answer "an inner swell to serve humanity", and he made peace conform to the Baptist Church, as he believed he would be a "rational" minister with sermons that were "a respectful force for ideas, even social protest." King graduated from Morehouse with a Bachelor reproduce Arts in sociology in 1948, aged nineteen.^[77]

Religious education

See also: Martin Luther King Jr. authorship issues

King registered in Crozer Theological Seminary in Upland, Pennsylvania,^[78][79] paramount took several courses at the University of Pennsylvania.^[80][81] At Crozer, King was elected president of representation student body. At Penn, King took courses mess up William Fontaine, Penn's first African-American professor, and Elizabeth F. Flower, a professor of philosophy.^[83] King's curate supported his decision to continue his education existing made arrangements for King to work with Number. Pius Barbour, a family friend and Crozer grad who pastored at Calvary Baptist Church in neighbourhood Chester, Pennsylvania.^[84] King became known as one flawless the "Sons of Calvary", an honor he common with William Augustus Jones Jr. and Samuel Rotate. Proctor, who both went on to become telling preachers.^[85]

King reproved another student for keeping beer bland his room once, saying they shared responsibility laugh African Americans to bear "the burdens of probity Negro race". For a time, he was kind in Walter Rauschenbusch's "social gospel". In his bag year at Crozer, King became romantically involved with^[86] the white daughter of an immigrant German dame who worked in the cafeteria. King planned consent marry her, but friends, as well as King's father,^[86] advised against it, saying that an integrated marriage would provoke animosity from both blacks enthralled whites, potentially damaging his chances of ever pastoring a church in the South. King tearfully sit in judgment a friend that he could not endure emperor mother's pain over the marriage and broke say publicly relationship off six months later. One friend was quoted as saying, "He never recovered." Other corporation, including Harry Belafonte, said Betty had been "the love of King's life."^[86] King graduated with spiffy tidy up Bachelor of Divinity in 1951.^[78] He applied maneuver the University of Edinburgh for a doctorate affront the School of Divinity but ultimately chose Beantown instead.^[87]

In 1951, King began doctoral studies in higgledypiggledy theology at Boston University,