Transcript Slide 1
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
1929-1968
January 15, l929
Martin Luther King Jr. is born
September, 1935
Martin Luther King begins school at the all
black Yonge Street Elementary School in
Atlanta
June 1944
• Martin Luther King enters Morehouse
College in Atlanta
February, l948
• Martin Luther King is ordained as a Baptist
minister. After graduating from Morehouse
College in June, he enters the Crozer
Theological Seminary in Chester,
Pennsylvania
Crozer Theological Seminary
June 18, 1953
Martin Luther King and Coretta Scott
are married.
Coretta Scott King
October, l954
• October, l954 Martin Luther King
becomes pastor of the Dexter Avenue
Church in Montgomery, Alabama.
Dexter Avenue Church
June 1955
• Martin Luther King receives his Ph.D. in
theology from Boston University.
November 17, l955
• Yolanda Denise King, the King's first
child, is born.
Yolanda Denise King
December 1, l955
• Mrs. Rosa Parks refuses to give up her
bus seat to a white man in Montgomery,
Alabama.
December 5, 1955
• Martin Luther King is elected president of
the Montgomery Improvement Association
and lead a year long boycott of the
Montgomery busses.
Rosa Parks died in 2005
January 26, l956
• Martin Luther King is arrested for the first
time, for a traffic violation.
January, 1957
• The Southern Christian Leadership
Conference is founded. Dr. King is
chosen president.
February, 1959
• Dr. King and his wife, Coretta Scott King,
visit India. They study Mahatma Gandhi's
methods of nonviolent protest.
January, l960
• The King family moves to Atlanta, where
Martin Luther King becomes co-pastor of
the Ebenezer Baptist Church with his
father, Martin Luther King, Sr.
Ebenezer Baptist Church
•
February, l960
• Students in Greensboro, North Carolina,
stage the first "sit-ins" at "whites-only"
lunch counters.
Lunch Counter Sit-Ins
Lunch Counter Sit-Ins
October l9, l960
• Martin Luther King is jailed after being
arrested at a sit-in at a lunch counter in
Atlanta.
January 30, l961
• Dexter Scott King is born.
May, l961
• "Freedom riders" leave Washington, D.C., by
Greyhound bus. The bus is burned by
opponents of desegregation, and the riders are
beaten upon arrival in Birmingham, Alabama.
September, 1962
• Black student James Meredith attempts to
enroll at the at the all-white University of
Mississippi.
March 28, l963
• Bernice Albertine King is born.
April l2, l963
• Martin Luther King is arrested and jailed
(for the thirteenth time) during a march in
Birmingham, Alabama.
May, l963
• Dogs and fire hoses are used by police in
Birmingham to stop protests.
August 28, l963
• 250,000 people demonstrate in Washington,
D.C., in support of civil rights. Martin Luther King
meets with President John F. Kennedy and
delivers his "I Have a Dream" speech.
November 22, l963
• President Kennedy is assassinated.
August, l964
• Three young civil rights workers are found
murdered in Philadelphia, Mississippi.
December, l964
• Martin Luther King receives the Nobel
Peace Prize.
March, l965
• Martin Luther King and the SCLC begin a voter
registration campaign in Alabama. Civil rights
protesters attempting to march from Selma,
Alabama, to Montgomery, Alabama, are beaten
by state patrolmen.
August, 1965
• The 1965 Voting Right Act is signed by
President Johnson.
March 28, l968
• Martin Luther King leads a march in
support of striking sanitation workers in
Memphis, Tennessee.
April 3, l968
• Martin Luther King delivers his last
speech, "I've Been to the Mountaintop.“
April 4, l968
• Martin Luther King is shot and killed at the
Lorraine Motel in Memphis.
• Dr. King Timeline and art work was
created by students of Room 100 at the
Buckman School in Los Angeles
Less Famous Facts
• The main item on King’s agenda in spring
of 1968 was the organization of a Poor
Peoples’ March on Washington where
thousands of disenfranchised Americans
of all races would descend on the capital
and protest the country’s economic
inequality.
Poor People’s Campaign
– Protest against economic inequality among
American people
– Brought together black, white, Native
American, and Hispanic poor
– Lived in a shantytown in D.C from May 14 –
June 24, 1968
– The movement was begun by King, but
carried out by Reverent Ralph Abernathy
Resurrection City, Aerial View
Resurrection City
Not Much Has Changed
On the Other Hand…
• 12.6% of the population was below the
poverty threshold in 2005
• 17.6% of children were in poverty
• 20.0% of children under 6 live in poverty
• 52.9% of children under 6, living with a
female householder with no spouse
present lived in poverty
• In 2005, 15.9 million people were classified as
“severely poor” – family incomes less than 50%
of their poverty threshold.
– The severely poor represented 43.1% of the poor
population
• As health care costs continue to rise as a
percentage of family income, more families
(including middle income) are unable to afford
health insurance
– In 2005, 46.6 million were without health insurance
(15.9%)
The King Center 1968
MLK Jr. Holiday
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Day of Service
Future National MLK, Jr.
Memorial in D.C.
Future MLK, Jr. Memorial in D.C.
Future MLK, Jr. Memorial in D.C.