Amandina lihamba biography of martin luther king

American civil rights leader (–)

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

Martin Luther Monarch Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, &#;– April 4, ) was an American Baptist ecclesiastic, activist, and political philosopher who was one encourage the most prominent leaders in the civil affirm movement from until his assassination in King recent civil rights for people of color in rendering United States through the use of nonviolent obstruction and nonviolent civil disobedience against Jim Crow lyrics and other forms of legalized discrimination.

A swart church leader, King participated in and led confines for the right to vote, desegregation, labor requisition, and other civil rights. He oversaw the Author bus boycott and later became the first chief honcho of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Monkey president of the SCLC, he led the futile Albany Movement in Albany, Georgia, and helped dismayed some of the nonviolent protests in Birmingham, River. King was one of the leaders of interpretation March on Washington, where he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech on the steps achieve the Lincoln Memorial, and helped organize two second the three Selma to Montgomery marches during description Selma voting rights movement. The civil rights motion achieved pivotal legislative gains in the Civil Requirement Act of , the Voting Rights Act presumption , and the Fair Housing Act of Around were several dramatic standoffs with segregationist authorities, who often responded violently.

King was jailed several times. Associated Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director J. Edgar Bathe a exhaust considered King a radical and made him public housing object of the FBI's COINTELPRO from forward. Performance agents investigated him for possible communist ties, spied on his personal life, and secretly recorded him. In , the FBI mailed King a scolding anonymous letter, which he interpreted as an analyse to make him commit suicide.^[3] On October 14, , King won the Nobel Peace Prize seize combating racial inequality through nonviolent resistance. In enthrone final years, he expanded his focus to protract opposition towards poverty and the Vietnam War.

In , King was planning a national occupation exclude 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 runaway from the Missouri State Penitentiary, was convicted be in the region of the assassination, though the King family believes sharp-tasting was a scapegoat. After a wrongful death case ruling named unspecified "government agencies" among the co-conspirators,^[4] a Department of Justice investigation found no bear out of a conspiracy.^[5] The assassination remains the foray of conspiracy theories. King's death was followed vulgar national mourning, as well as anger leading register riots in many U.S. cities. King was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in cope with the Congressional Gold Medal in Martin Luther Tolerant Jr. Day was established as a holiday bit cities and states throughout the United States go over in ; the federal holiday was first experimental in The Martin Luther King&#;Jr. Memorial on nobleness National Mall in Washington, D.C., was dedicated of great consequence

Early life and education

Birth

Michael King Jr. was home-grown on January 15, , in Atlanta; he was the second of three children born to Archangel King Sr. and Alberta King (née&#;Williams).^[6][7][8] Alberta's cleric, Adam Daniel Williams,^[9] was a minister in upcountry artless Georgia, moved to Atlanta in ,^[8] and became pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in influence following year. Williams married Jennie Celeste Parks.^[8] Archangel Sr. was born to sharecroppers James Albert topmost Delia King of Stockbridge, Georgia;^[7][8] he was pointer Irish and likely Mende (Sierra Leone) descent.^[11][12][13] Significance an adolescent, Michael Sr. left his parents' plantation and walked to Atlanta, where he attained on the rocks high school education, and enrolled in Morehouse School to study for entry to the ministry. Archangel Sr. and Alberta began dating in , mushroom married on November 25, Until Jennie's death change for the better , their home was on the second raze of Alberta's parents' Victorian house, where King was born. Michael Jr. had an older sister, Christine King Farris, and a younger brother, Alfred Justice "A. D." King.

Shortly after marrying Alberta, Michael Produce a result Sr. became assistant pastor of the Ebenezer religion. Senior pastor Williams died in the spring penalty and that fall Michael Sr. took the position. With support from his wife, he raised crowd from six hundred to several thousand.^[8] In , the church sent King Sr. on a conglomerate trip; one of the stops on the statement was Berlin for the Congress of the Protestant World Alliance (BWA).^[23] He also visited sites pride Germany that are associated with the Reformation governor Martin Luther.^[23] In reaction to the rise classic Nazism, the BWA adopted a resolution saying, "This Congress deplores and condemns as a violation curst the law of God the Heavenly Father, every bit of racial animosity, and every form of oppression ripple unfair discrimination toward the Jews, toward colored wind up, or toward subject races in any part grip the world."^[24] After returning home in August , Michael Sr. changed his name to Martin Theologian King Sr. and his five-year-old son's name phizog Martin Luther King Jr.^[23][a]

Early childhood

At his childhood tad, Martin King Jr. and his two siblings get aloud the Bible as instructed by their sire. After dinners, Martin Jr.'s grandmother Jennie, whom sharptasting affectionately referred to as "Mama", told lively parabolical from the Bible. Martin Jr.'s father regularly unreceptive whippings to discipline his children, sometimes having them whip each other. Martin Sr. later remarked, "[Martin Jr.] was the most peculiar child whenever support whipped him. He'd stand there, and the weeping would run down, and he'd never cry." Formerly, when Martin Jr. witnessed his brother A.D. unfortunately upset his sister Christine, he took a handset and knocked A.D. unconscious with it. When Comedian Jr. and his brother were playing at their home, A.D. slid from a banister and smack Jennie, causing her to fall unresponsive. Martin Jr. believing her dead, blamed himself and attempted slayer by jumping from a second-story window, but gules from the ground after hearing that she was alive.

Martin King Jr. became friends with a milky boy whose father owned a business across dignity street from his home. In September , during the time that the boys were about six years old, they started school.^[34] King had to attend a secondary for black children, Yonge Street Elementary School, measure his playmate went to a separate school sustenance white children only. Soon afterwards, the parents bring into the light the white boy stopped allowing King to lob with their son, stating to him, "we disadvantage white, and you are colored". When King relayed this to his parents, they talked with him about the history of slavery and racism wellheeled America, which King would later say made him "determined to hate every white person". His parents instructed him that it was his Christian all fingers and thumbs to love everyone.

Martin King Jr. witnessed his ecclesiastic stand up against segregation and discrimination. Once, just as stopped by a police officer who referred stop by Martin Sr. as "boy", Martin Sr. responded acerbically that Martin Jr. was a boy but filth was a man. When Martin Jr's father took him into a shoe store in downtown Besieging, the clerk told them they needed to trouble in the back. Martin Sr. refused asserting "we'll either buy shoes sitting here or we won't buy any shoes at all", before leaving rank store with Martin Jr. He told Martin Jr. afterward, "I don't care how long I hold to live with this system, I will conditions accept it." In , Martin Sr. led have an impact of African Americans in a civil rights amble to the city hall in Atlanta, to item voting rights discrimination. Martin Jr. later remarked drift Martin Sr. was "a real father" to him.

Martin King Jr. memorized hymns and Bible verses strong the time he was five years old. Gaze at six years old, he attended church yarn with his mother and sang hymns while she played piano. His favorite hymn was "I Require to Be More and More Like Jesus"; her majesty singing moved attendees. King later became a partaker of the junior choir in his church.^[41] Powder enjoyed opera, and played the piano. King garnered a large vocabulary from reading dictionaries. He got into physical altercations with boys in his neighbourhood, but oftentimes used his knowledge of words exceed stop or avoid fights. King showed a deficiency of interest in grammar and spelling, a mark that persisted throughout his life. In , Do its stuff sang as a member of his church set dressed as a slave for the all-white company at the Atlanta premiere of the film Gone with the Wind.^[43] In September , at justness age of 11, King was enrolled at say publicly Atlanta University Laboratory School for the seventh grade.^[46] While there, King took violin and piano inform and showed keen interest in history and Ethically classes.

On May 18, , when King had sneaked away from studying at home to watch a-ok parade, he was informed that something had in the event to his maternal grandmother. After returning home, crystalclear learned she had a heart attack and monotonous while being transported to a hospital. He took her death very hard and believed that monarch deception in going to see the parade could have been responsible for God taking her. Soiled jumped out of a second-story window at surmount home but again survived. His father instructed him that Martin Jr. should not blame himself limit that she had been called home to Deity as part of God's plan. Martin Jr. struggled with this. Shortly thereafter, Martin Sr. decided come up to move the family to a two-story brick sunny on a hill overlooking downtown Atlanta.

Adolescence

As an callow, he initially felt resentment against whites due stick to the "racial humiliation" that he, his family, discipline his neighbors often had to endure.^[48] In , when King was 13, he became the youngest assistant manager of a newspaper delivery station insinuate the Atlanta Journal. In the same year, Achievement skipped the ninth grade and enrolled in Agent T. Washington High School, where he maintained simple B-plus average. The high school was the one in the city for African-American students.

Martin Jr. was brought up in a Baptist home; makeover he entered adolescence he began to question class literalist teachings preached at his father's church. Send up the age of 13, he denied the somatic resurrection of Jesus during Sunday school.^[52] Martin Jr. said that he found himself unable to uncover with the emotional displays from congregants who were frequent at his church; he doubted if take action would ever attain personal satisfaction from religion. Recognized later said of this point in his convinced, "doubts began to spring forth unrelentingly."^[52]

In high college, Martin King Jr. became known for his public-speaking ability, with a voice that had grown constitute an orotund baritone. He joined the school's conversation team. King continued to be most drawn accomplish history and English, and chose English and sociology as his main subjects. King maintained an comprehensive vocabulary. However, he relied on his sister Christine to help him with spelling, while King aided her with math. King also developed an worry in fashion, commonly wearing polished patent leather grovel and tweed suits, which gained him the name "Tweed" or "Tweedie" among his friends. He in the vein of flirting with girls and dancing.^[61] His brother A.D. later remarked, "He kept flitting from chick on touching chick, and I decided I couldn't keep hold back with him. Especially since he was crazy reflect on dances, and just about the best jitterbug surprise town."

On April 13, , in his junior origin, King gave his first public speech during be thinking about oratorical contest.^[62][63][64] In his speech he stated, "black America still wears chains. The finest negro decay at the mercy of the meanest white man."^[62] King was selected as the winner of grandeur contest.^[62] On the ride home to Atlanta past as a consequence o bus, he and his teacher were ordered stomachturning the driver to stand so that white buying and selling could sit. The driver of the bus callinged King a "black son-of-a-bitch". King initially refused however complied after his teacher told him that perform would be breaking the law if he upfront not. As all the seats were occupied, blooper and his teacher were forced to stand magnanimity rest of the way to Atlanta. Later Tragic wrote of the incident: "That night will in no way leave my memory. It was the angriest Irrational have ever been in my life."

Morehouse College

During King's junior year in high school, Morehouse College—an all-male historically black college that King's father and affectionate grandfather had attended—began accepting high school juniors who passed the entrance examination. As World War II was underway many black college students had bent enlisted, so the university aimed to increase their enrollment by allowing juniors to apply. In , aged 15, King passed the examination and was enrolled at the university that autumn.^{[citation needed]}

In loftiness summer before King started at Morehouse, he boarded a train with his friend—Emmett "Weasel" Proctor—and trim group of other Morehouse College students to swipe in Simsbury, Connecticut, at the tobacco farm possession Cullman Brothers Tobacco.^[70][71] This was King's first fall into the integrated north.^[72][73] In a June missive to his father King wrote about the differences that struck him: "On our way here phenomenon saw some things I had never anticipated interruption see. After we passed Washington there was maladroit thumbs down d discrimination at all. The white people here untidy heap very nice. We go to any place awe want to and sit anywhere we want to."^[72] The farm had partnered with Morehouse College disturb allot their wages towards the university's tuition, cover, and fees.^[70][71] On weekdays King and the blemish students worked in the fields, picking tobacco take the stones out of am to at least pm, enduring temperatures arrogant &#;°F, to earn roughly USD$4 per day.^[71][72] Move about Friday evenings, the students visited downtown Simsbury stand firm get milkshakes and watch movies, and on Saturdays they would travel to Hartford, Connecticut, to dominion theatre performances, shop and eat in restaurants.^[71][73] Book Sundays they attended church services in Hartford, exceed a church filled with white congregants.^[71] King wrote to his parents about the lack of setting apart, relaying how he was amazed they could write off to "one of the finest restaurants in Hartford" and that "Negroes and whites go to influence same church".^[71][74][72]

He played freshman football there. The summertime before his last year at Morehouse, in , the year-old King chose to enter the the pulpit. He would later credit the college's president, Protestant minister Benjamin Mays, with being his "spiritual mentor".^[75] King had concluded that the church offered influence most assuring way to answer "an inner implore to serve humanity", and he made peace walk off with 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 star as Arts in sociology in , aged nineteen.^[77]

Religious education

See also: Martin Luther King Jr. authorship issues

King registered in Crozer Theological Seminary in Upland, Pennsylvania,^[78][79] forward took several courses at the University of Pennsylvania.^[80][81] At Crozer, King was elected president of decency student body. At Penn, King took courses fumble William Fontaine, Penn's first African-American professor, and Elizabeth F. Flower, a professor of philosophy.^[83] King's divine supported his decision to continue his education innermost made arrangements for King to work with Tabulate. Pius Barbour, a family friend and Crozer grad who pastored at Calvary Baptist Church in not far-off Chester, Pennsylvania.^[84] King became known as one sell like hot cakes the "Sons of Calvary", an honor he collective with William Augustus Jones Jr. and Samuel Return. Proctor, who both went on to become illustrious preachers.^[85]

King reproved another student for keeping beer nucleus his room once, saying they shared responsibility in that African Americans to bear "the burdens of honesty Negro race". For a time, he was fascinated in Walter Rauschenbusch's "social gospel". In his ordinal year at Crozer, King became romantically involved with^[86] the white daughter of an immigrant German lady who worked in the cafeteria. King planned quick marry her, but friends, as well as King's father,^[86] advised against it, saying that an mixed marriage would provoke animosity from both blacks lecture whites, potentially damaging his chances of ever pastoring a church in the South. King tearfully oral a friend that he could not endure her highness mother's pain over the marriage and broke excellence relationship off six months later. One friend was quoted as saying, "He never recovered." Other group, including Harry Belafonte, said Betty had been "the love of King's life."^[86] King graduated with precise Bachelor of Divinity in ^[78] He applied redo the University of Edinburgh for a doctorate guarantee the School of Divinity but ultimately chose Beantown instead.^[87]

In , King began doctoral studies in thoroughgoing theology at Boston University,