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A hero is born

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was born in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1929. At the time in that part of the country, segregation-or the separation of races in places like schools, buses, and restaurants-was the law. He experienced racial predjudice from the time he was very young, which inspired him to dedicate his life to achieving equality and justice for Americans of all colors. King believed that peaceful refusal to obey unjust law was the best way to bring about social change.

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Civil Rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., never backed down in his stand against racism. Learn more about the life of this courageous hero who inspired millions of people to right a historical wrong.

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Martin Luther King Jr. (January 15, 1929-April 4, 1968) is considered one of history's greatest speakers and social activists. His leadership in peaceful protests helped end segregation during the American civil rights movement.

When Martin Luther King Jr. was born, his parents, Michael and Alberta, gave him a different name from the one we know today. They called him Michael. But Michael Sr. later changed his name and his son's to Martin Luther, after the famous religious leader. The middle-class family was very religious. Both Martin's father and grandfather were pastors in Atlanta, Georgia. The King children grew up in a loving home but experienced racism from an early age.

Separate Is Never Equal

King attended segregated public schools in Georgia. He skipped the ninth and eleventh grades and graduated from high school at 15. It was around that time that he joined the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), a civil rights organization. King's father led the NAACP's Atlanta chapter.

In 1948, King graduated from Morehouse College, in Atlanta. He went on to study religion at Crozer Theological Seminary, in Chester, Pennsylvania. In 1951, he graduated with honors and was class valedictorian. Soon after, he enrolled in a Ph.D. program at Boston University (B.U.), in Massachusetts. He met music student Coretta Scott in Boston. The couple married in 1953 and later had two sons and two daughters.

In 1954, while completing his degree, King moved to Montgomery, Alabama. He became pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. Soon after, on December 1, 1955, a woman named Rosa Parks was arrested after refusing to give her seat to white passengers on a Montgomery city bus. In response, the NAACP chose King to lead a citywide bus boycott. For 381 days, members of the black community walked or carpooled to work. Many of them were attacked.

The NAACP filed a lawsuit against the city of Montgomery. They argued that segregation on city buses was unconstitutional. On November 13, 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that such segregation was indeed illegal. The court based its decision, in part, on Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. In that case, the court concluded that "separate is never equal."

One year later, King, along with 60 ministers and activists, founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).

"I Have a Dream"

In the spring of 1963, King organized a protest in Birmingham, Alabama. The event drew nationwide attention. That's because city police officers blasted participants with fire hoses and let attack dogs loose. King and others were jailed.

After their release, King and other civil rights leaders laid plans for a demonstration in the nation's capital. The March on Washington attracted more than 200,000 people. On August 28, 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, King gave his "I Have a Dream" speech. He spoke of a day when all men would be treated equally. King went on to win the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize. He was 35 years old and the youngest person to have received the honor.

Reaching the Promised Land

The fight for equal rights, however, was far from over. On March 7, 1965, demonstrators set off on a 54-mile march, organized by King, from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. The event became violent when police met marchers with nightsticks and tear gas on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, in Selma. Seventeen people ended up in the hospital. King was not present, but he watched the scene unfold on TV. Soon after, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The law stated that all citizens had a right to vote, no matter the color of their skin.

On April 3, 1968, King traveled to Memphis, Tennessee, in support of striking sanitation workers. In a speech there, he said, "I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land." The next day, he was shot while standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel, where he was staying. The assassination ended King's life. He was 39 years old. It sparked riots in more than 100 cities. The accused shooter, James Earl Ray, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 99 years in prison.

"I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

In the United States, King's birthday is observed as a national holiday on the third Monday in January. On that day, many Americans volunteer at shelters, schools, hospitals, and other community organizations to honor the civil rights leader's legacy of service and commitment.

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Martin Luther King Jr. (January 15, 1929-April 4, 1968) is considered one of history's greatest speakers and social activists. His leadership in peaceful protests helped end segregation during the American civil rights movement. When Martin Luther King Jr. was born,...

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The Story of Martin Luther King Jr. by Kid President

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⚖️📚 A Picture Book of Martin Luther King, Jr.

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I Am Martin Luther King Jr by Brad Meltzer| Books Read Aloud| StoryTimeWithMsMelange

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Martin's Big Words: The Life of Martin Luther King Jr.

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Black History Dr Martin Luther King Jr Biography for Kids Educational Videos for Students

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Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr: Biography for Children, American History for Kids - FreeSchool

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King's "I Have a Dream" Speech

Freedom's Ring is Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, animated. Here you can compare the written and spoken speech, explore multimedia images, listen to movement activists, and uncover historical context. Fifty years ago, as the culminating address of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, King demanded the riches of freedom and the security of justice. Today, his language of love, nonviolent direct action, and redemptive suffering resonates globally in the millions who stand up for freedom together and elevate democracy to its ideals. How do the echoes of King's Dream live within you?

Credits & Acknowledgements

Director, Art and Content: Evan Bissell
Design and Programming: Erik Loyer
Content, Curriculum Design and Project Coordinator: Andrea McEvoy Spero
Project Advisor: Clayborne Carson
Video: Owen Bissell
Project Administration: Regina Covington

Freedom's Ring is a project of The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford University in collaboration with Beacon Press's King Legacy Series.

We extend our deep appreciation to the many people whose work and lives contributed to Freedom's Ring. Thank you to the interviewees: Aldo Billingslea, Clayborne Carson, Dorothy Cotton, Miriam Glickman, Kazu Haga, Bruce Hartford, Ericka Huggins, Clarence B. Jones, Kim Nalley, Wazir Peacock, and Marcus Shelby.

Thank you to Tenisha Armstrong. Her dedication and tireless efforts in editing Dr. King's papers allow us to make this history available to teachers and students.

Thank you to the many photographers whose work has inspired much of this project and allowed these important histories to continue. We have made our best efforts to credit these photographers. They include: Bob Adelman, Eve Arnold, George Ballis, Martha Cooper, Benedict Fernandez, Bob Fitch, Declan Haun, Matt Herron, John Loengard, Danny Lyon, Spider Martin, Charles Moore/Black Star, Herbert Randall, Steve Schapiro, Flip Schulke, Maria Varela, and Tamio Wakayama.

Thank you to David Stein for his invaluable contributions and conversations about this history. Thanks to Lucas Guilkey for his work on the videos, Ming-kuo Hung for editing support, and Naomi Wilson for her comments on content.

Thanks to Beacon Press for editing support.

Thanks to Headlands Center for the Arts for the time and space to finish the project.

The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute Staff:

Clayborne Carson
Director

Tenisha Armstrong
Associate Director and Editor of the King Papers Project

Regina Covington
Administrator

Andrea McEvoy Spero
Director of Education

Clarence B. Jones
Scholar in Residence

Susan Carson
Editorial Consultant

Stacey Zwald
Assistant Editor

Dave Beals
Research Assistant

Video hosting by Critical Commons
Content management by Scalar,
a project of the Alliance for Networking Visual Culture

Works Cited

Baldwin, James. The Fire Next Time. New York: Dell, 1985. Print.

Branch, Taylor. Parting the Waters: America in the King years, 1954-63. New York : Simon and Schuster, 1988. Print.

Carson, Clayborne, eds. The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr.. New York: Intellectual Properties Management; Warner Books, 1998. Print.

Freed, Leonard. This Is the Day: The March on Washington. Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2013. Print.

Hansen, Drew D.. The Dream: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Speech that Inspired a Nation. New York : Ecco. 2003. Print.

Johnson, Charles and Bob Adelman. King: The Photobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr. New York : Viking, 2000. Print.

Jones, Clarence B. and Stuart Connelly. Behind the Dream: The Making of the Speech that Transformed a Nation. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Print.

Jones, William P.. The March on Washington: Jobs, Freedom and the Forgotten History of Civil Rights. New York : W.W. Norton, 2013. Print.

Jones, William P. and Labor and Working-Class History Association. "The Unknown Origins of the March on Washington: Civil Rights Politics and the Black Working Class." Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas 7.3 (2010). Print.

Kasher, Steven. The Civil Rights Movement: A Photographic History, 1954-68. New York: Abbeville, 1996. Print.

Katznelson, Ira. Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time. New York: Liveright, 2013. Print.

Kelen, Leslie G., eds. This Light of Ours: Activist Photographers of the Civil Rights Movement. Jackson : University Press of Mississippi, 2011. Print.

LaFayette, Jr., Bernard and David C. Jehnsen. The Nonviolence Briefing Booklet: A 2-Day Orientation to Kingian Nonviolence Conflict Reconciliation. 1995. Galena: Institute for Human Rights and Responsibilities. 2007. Print.

Le Blanc, Paul. "Freedom Budget: The Promise of the Civil Rights Movement for Economic Justice." WorkingUSA: The Journal of Labor & Society 16 (2013), 43-58. Print.

Levine, Ellen. Freedom's Children : Young Civil Rights Activists Tell Their Own Stories. New York : Putnam, 1993. Print.

Lewis, John and Michael D'Orso. Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1998. Print.

Sundquist, Eric J.. King's Dream. New Haven : Yale University, 2009. Print.

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Freedom's Ring is Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, animated. Here you can compare the written and spoken speech, explore multimedia images, listen to movement activists, and uncover historical context. Fifty years ago, as the culminating address of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, King demanded the riches of freedom and the security of justice.