Martin Luther King Jr Biography

A Baptist minister and activist Martin Luther King Jr., who until his death in 1968, the assassination of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States since the mid-1950s had led.

Summary

Martin Luther King Jr. in Atlanta, Georgia on January 15, 1929 was born. King, a Baptist minister and civil-rights activists both, a seismic effect on race relations in the United States had started the mid-1950s. King led the SCLC in a lot of effort. Through his activism in other parts of the South and the African-American citizens a pivotal role in ending legal segregation, as well as the 1964 Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act of 1965, King won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, played in several other honors. King was assassinated in April 1968, and in the history of African-American leaders often praised by his 1963 speech continues to be referenced as one, "I have a dream."

Early Years

January 15, 1929 as the date on Michael King, Jr., Sr. and Alberta Williams King, Michael Martin Luther King Jr. was the middle child. King and Williams families is rooted in rural Georgia. Martin Jr.'s grandfather, AD Williams is a rural minister for years, and then moved to Atlanta in 1893, he took over a small, struggling Ebenezer Baptist Church, about 13 members of the congregation made a forceful. He married Jennie Celeste park and one child that survived, was in Alberta. Michael King Sr. came from a poor peasant family in the community is a tenant. In 1926, after eight years of courtship, he married Alberta. AD Williams moved into the house of newlyweds in Atlanta.

Michael King Sr., his father's death in 1931, he became a very successful minister as pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church, stepped, and the German Protestant religious leader named in honor of Martin Luther, Martin Luther King Sr. passed. In time, Michael Jr. followed his father's lead and adopt the name itself.

One young sister, Willie Christine Martin, and a younger brother, Alfred Daniel Williams King was. The king of the children grew up in a safe and loving environment. When his wife's humility is easily balanced hand with more stringent Martin Sr., was a more disciplinarian. Although they tried, Martin Jr. undoubtedly her parents racism can not completely shield. Martin Luther King Sr. fight against racial prejudice, not only suffered because of his race, but because he is considered to be an affront to God's will, racism and segregation. Martin Jr. strongly that he left a lasting impression on the children in her class to discourage any sense of superiority

Atlanta, Georgia in the manifest, Martin Luther King Jr. entered public school at the age of 5. In May, 1936, he was baptized, but a little on the weighty events. May, 1941 at the age of 12, Martin grandmother, Jenny, died of a cardiac arrest. Event because of her parents' against the wishes of watching a parade for Martin, who died when he was traumatic, more so. Distraught at the news, young Martin jumped from the window of a second home, accused of attempting to commit suicide.

King Booker T. Washington High School, where he was said to be a precocious student attended. He skipped both the ninth and eleventh grades, and Morehouse College in Atlanta, the 15-year-old, in 1944, he was a popular student with classmates, especially his wife, but an unmotivated student who floated in his first two years. Although his family was deeply involved in church and worship, young Martin about religion in general and of religious worship, felt uncomfortable with overly emotional displays. This continued through a lot of discomfort adolescence, primarily its leading entering the Ministry of panic, a lot of decisions that go against his father. But in his junior year, Martin, took a Bible class to renew his faith and began to imagine a career in the ministry. Read his senior year, he told his father of his decision.

Education and spiritual growth

In 1948, Martin Luther King Jr. is a sociology degree from Morehouse College and Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, was generous. He studies all thrived, and was valedictorian of her class in 1951, and elected student body president. He was awarded the Fellowship for graduate study. But Martin drink beer and play pool at the time of his father rebelled against the effects of more conservative. He became involved with a white woman, and went through a tough time, he can break off the affair.

In his last year of seminary, Morehouse College President Benjamin E. Mays Martin Luther King Jr. King's command, who came under the influence of spiritual development. He was an outspoken advocate for racial equality Mays and a potential force for social change and encourage Christians to see the king. For her doctoral study in various colleges, including Yale and Edinburgh in Scotland after being accepted at Boston University, he enrolled in.

This is the time to work on his doctorate, Martin Luther King Jr., Coretta Scott, an aspiring singer and musician meets New England Conservatory in Boston school. They married in June 1953 and four children, s, Martin Luther King III and Bernice Scott was Dexter. In 1954, while still working thesis, King Montgomery, Alabama pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church became. He completed his PhD degree was awarded in 1955 at the age of only 25 years.

Montgomery Bus Boycott

March 2, 1955, a 15-year-old girl on a Montgomery city bus to a white man who violate local laws refused to give up her seat. Claudette Colvin was arrested and taken to jail. First, NAACP local chapter felt they had a good test case to challenge the principle of Montgomery's buses were segregated. However, it is known that she was deeply religious and civil rights leaders are afraid the black community is stigmatized and Colvin (and, thus the effort) to be less than credible in the eyes of whites were sympathetic.

December 1, 1955, they got another chance to make their case. That evening, a tiring day at work, 42-year-old Rosa Parks boarded a bus to go home Cleveland Avenue. He's in the middle of the bus, "colored" section behind the first row. As his bus route, all the seats in the travel section of the white filling, and several white passengers boarded the bus. The bus driver was standing there with a few white men, and claimed that there were parks and several other African Americans to give up their seats. Three other African-American passengers reluctantly gave up their place, but sitting in the park. The driver asked again and again, she refused to give up her seat. Parks was arrested and held for Montgomery City code violations. A week later, at the time of his trial, a 30-minute hearing, the park was convicted and fined $ 10 thousand and $ 4 court fee was assessed.

Rosa Parks was arrested that night, E.D. Nixon on, the head of the local NAACP chapter plans a Citywide bus boycott, Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders met with the local. He is to lead a boycott of young, well-trained and professional standing solid family connections were elected. But he was new in the community, and there were a few enemies, so it was thought that the black community will be stronger credibility.

King declared in his first speech as president of the group, "We have no alternative but to protest. For many years we have shown an amazing patience. We are sometimes our white brothers the feeling that we were being treated like the way we are. But we have the patience of our anything less than freedom and justice in order to survive as a patient come tonight. "

Martin Luther King, Jr.'s fresh and skillful rhetoric Alabama civil rights struggles in a new energy. Bus boycott work, harassment, violence, and intimidation for Montgomery African-American community will be walking the 382 days. Both King and E.D. Nixon attacked the homes. But the African American communities of the Supreme Court, arguing that it "is not equal to the separate" decision Brown v. Board of Education was based on the unconstitutional take legal action against the city ordinance. And several lower court rulings defeated after suffering large financial losses to the city of Montgomery lifted segregated public transportation make it mandatory.