Martin Luther King Jr Facts

10 Martin Luther King Jr Childhood Facts

1. Dr. Martin Luther King was born on January 15, 1929 to Reverend Martin Luther King, Sr. and Alberta Williams King in Atlanta, Georgia.
2. Originally name "Michael King Jr", King's father changed both their names in honor of the German Protestant leader Martin Luther, after taking a trip to Europe in 1934.
3. King attended a private elementary school named Oglethorpe Elementary School, where his parents paid $25 a year to cover his expenses.
4. King first experienced racial discrimination when his white neighbors refused to let him play with their kids. Leaving a profound impression on the young man.
5. King attended Booker T. Washington High School in Atlanta. He was younger than most of the students and also skipped some subjects because he already knew the subject matter.
6. King skipped both 9th grade and 12th grade of high school and enrolled into Morehouse College at the age of 15.
7. King received his Doctorate from Boston University. After graduating he then became a minister at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama.
8. King and Coretta Scott was married on June 18, 1953 at her parents house in Heiberger, Alabama. They later had 4 children: Yolanda King, Martin Luther King III, Dexter Scott King, and Bernice King
9. Inspired by Gandhi's success with non-violent activism, King visited Gandhi's birthplace in India in 1959. Here is where King had a deeper understanding of non-violent resistance and further committed himself to Americas struggle for civil rights
10. King Influences includes: Gandhi, Jesus Christ, Abraham Lincoln, Benjamin Mays, Hosea Williams, Bayard Rustin, Henry David Thoreau, Howard Thurman and Leo Tolstoy.

More Martin Luther King Jr Facts

• On December 1,1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. And because of this King help created The Montgomery Bus Boycott. The boycott lasted 385 days and it became so volatile and intense, that King's house was bombed. But in the end the United States District Court ruled to end racial segregation on all Montgomery public buses.
• In 1957, King co-founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). This group was created to help harness the moral authority and organizing power of black churches to conduct non-violent protests in the service of civil rights reform. King led the SCLC until his death.
• In 1963, King was jailed for Birmingham, Alabama after King defied a state court issued barring protests and employing marches. During his incarcentation, King wrote the famous "Letter from a Birmingham Jail."
• On August 28, 1963, approximately 250,000 blacks and whites marched on Washington, D.C., to raise the nation's consciousness of civil rights and to encourage the passage of the Civil Rights Bill before Congress at that time. There King delivered his "I Have A Dream" speech.
• King was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on December 10,1964.
• Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated on April 4th, 1968 by James Earl Ray.
• On January 17, 2000, for the first time, Martin Luther King Jr. Day was officially observed in all fifty U.S. states.
• On Oct. 16, 2011 a 4-acre Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, complete with a 28 foot tall statute of King was revealed on Washington D.C's Mall.

Martin Luther King Jr Quotes

List of Quotes From Martin Luther King Jr

• "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."
• "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
• "In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
• "I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear."
• "If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward."
• "Let no man pull you low enough to hate him."
• "Never, never be afraid to do what's right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake. Society's punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way."
• "The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."
• "Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity."
• "A man who won't die for something is not fit to live."
  
  Quotes Source: GoodReads.com