We
Americans worship heroes we barely know.
We follow athletes because of their sports statistics rather than their
character or what they stand for. We
elect presidents because they can argue persuasively in debates, even when we
don’t know much about their lives or lifestyles.
Martin
Luther King is an exception. He is an
American hero that wanted to be known.
He had the most incredible family roots and beliefs that he communicated
powerfully through the written and spoken word.
While he was known for his letters and speeches, there is still enough
about him that remains a mystery.
Today, I celebrate his birthday by re-publishing this blog. These are surprising bits of trivia about Martin Luther King that I hope you enjoy:
1. Martin Luther King was not his real name.
Michael was born in Atlanta in 1929, named after his father,
Michael Sr. When he was only two years old, Michael Jr. (our
beloved MLK) went with his family to Europe. Michael Senior was so profoundly
affected by the person of Martin Luther, the great reformer, that upon
his return to the States changed his name to Martin Luther King, Sr. and
his son’s to Martin Luther King, Jr.
2. He came a powerful and spiritual family.
His father and mother were both ordained
Reverends and respected leaders in the Atlanta community. They shared a
home with his maternal grandparents, the Reverend and Mrs. A.D. Williams.
While the Kings were known for their virtue,
they were also seen as radicals, embracing equality not only among the races,
but among the sexes. The King men were
staunch believers in the power of Jesus Christ and the Bible and believed in
living according to the word of God, which teaches nothing less. They led Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta,
right down the street from their home.
3. His call to stand up for the civil rights of
a nation started in childhood.
As a black child, Martin Jr. was introduced to
the world his own black parents had to live in – a world that was racially
segregated. It really didn’t matter that his parents were educated; the American
south had enforced laws about the separation of blacks and whites.
Etched clearly in King’s memory was a family
trip to buy new shoes. Little Martin was excited at the prospect, only to
enter the store and be immediately ushered to the back exit.
“No coloreds.” The store owner said to them,
angrily.
Martin learned on that day that
blacks were not allowed in most restaurants, on public beaches or swimming pools.
They couldn’t drink from the same water fountains as white people and couldn’t
use the same toilets.
While these experiences were commonplace for all blacks
in the south, it started a fire in Martin's heart. This event began to shape King's passionate crusade for
righteousness.
4. He graduated high school at 15.
MLK skipped both 9th and 12th grades (some historians have him
skipping the 11th), and enrolled in Morehouse College, a prestigious private, all-male, black university in
Atlanta. He graduated with a Bachelors degree in sociology at age 19.
5. He thought his wife was brave for taking him
on.
After
Morehouse, King completed seminary
and was introduced to Coretta Scott, a woman whose wit and vigor was an
incredible match for his.
As much as Martin is celebrated, Corrie (what
he called her) was as well. A brilliant
thinker, gorgeous in physical appearance and social graces, Coretta was also
known for her voice: a mezzo-soprano.
Her voice, Martin said later, was angelic and worshipful.
On the night they wed, the newlyweds were
denied entrance to their hotel (supposedly booked knowing it was a whites-only
place). The couple decided to spend
their wedding night at a Black-owned funeral home. It was only the beginning of many stands for
justice they took together.
6. He’s
called “Dr. Martin Luther King” because he was a PhD. This title was not honorary.
After marriage, King became pastor of the
Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, when he was twenty-five
years old. He then began doctoral
studies in systematic theology at Boston University and received his Ph. D in 1955.
He was just getting started.
7. Rosa
sat down and Martin stood up - in that order.
On a December,1955 evening in Montgomery, Rosa
Parks rode the bus home seated in the fifth row, which was permissible. It was, after all, the first row of the
"colored section".
It was standard practice that when the bus
became full, the seats nearer the front were given to white passengers. This happened and the bus driver asked Parks
and three other African-Americans seated nearby to move: “Move y'all, I want
those two seats!"
Three riders complied, but Parks did not.
The bus driver threatened to have her arrested,
and Ms. Parks said he had every freedom to do that. She wasn’t breaking any written law; she was
just uppity and he called her bluff.
Upon hearing of the arrest, King and his
colleague (Ralph Abernathy) organized a city-wide boycott intended to cripple
the financial legs of the bus companies.
A staunch devotee of nonviolence, the men were adamant that no one
should lose their cool.
Martin wrote to the city with the organized
plan of protest: Black passengers should be treated with courtesy. Seating
should be allotted on a first-come-first-serve basis, with white passengers
sitting from front to back and black passengers sitting from back to front. Negro
drivers should drive routes that primarily serviced Negroes.
On Monday, December 5, 1955 the boycott went
into effect – it was the beginning of organized non-violent protests across the
south. Martin was at the forefront of a
revolution.
8. He
was a man determined to be seen and heard.
From
1957 until his death in 1968, King gave over 2,500 speeches; he traveled more
than 6 million miles; and he wrote five
books and countless articles published in newspapers and magazines.
Upon
seeing him deliver his “I Have a Dream” speech, John F. Kennedy, amazed and open-mouthed, turned to his chief of staff and said, “Damn, he’s good!”
My
favorite writing of his (besides the PERFECT “I have a Dream” speech) is the letter he wrote from an Alabama jail to
the surrounding clergymen. This portion resonates the most in my soul:
“We have waited for more than 340
years for our constitutional and God given rights. The nations of Asia and
Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but
we still creep at horse and buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a
lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging
darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious
mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers
at whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick and even kill
your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty
million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst
of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your
speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six year old daughter why she
can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on
television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown
is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning
to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her
personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when
you have to concoct an answer for a five year old son who is asking:
"Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you
take a cross county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in
the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you;
when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading
"white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes
"nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you
are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are
never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day
and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at
tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with
inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating
sense of "nobodiness"--then you will understand why we find it
difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and
men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope,
sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience…”
9. MLK set his face towards Jerusalem.
Martin
had two heroes: Jesus Christ and Martin
Luther. Both men were killed in the
middle of their ministry, for their beliefs.
Martin seemed to recognize the
same would be true for him.
After
many, many death threats and his own people warning him to “go underground for
awhile” Martin eventually made peace with the destiny he had – to die for the
cause worth dying for. On April 3, 1968
(the day before he was assassinated), he preached at the at Mason Temple in
Memphis, Tennessee:
“Well, I don't know what will happen
now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now.
Because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would
like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about
that now. I just want to do God's will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the
mountain. And I've looked over. And 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. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about a thing.
I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the
Lord.”
10. Martin’s heart betrayed a life lived at full
speed.
King
was assassinated in Memphis when he was 39, after two other attempts on his
life. The details of the assassination
are sketchy, but it alleged to be a conspiracy.
At the hospital, one of the attending doctors
noted during his autopsy that King “had the heart of a 60-year-old." A heart that was tired; overworked and
stressed – beating in the man that championed respect and nonviolence.
Martin,
we hardly knew ye…