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M artin L uther K ing J r .
2016 special edition
January 13, 2016
Martin Luther King Jr. 1929 – 1968
A timeline of accomplishments
Born in Georgia
Jan. 15, 1929 -- Martin Luther King
was born in 1929 in Atlanta, Ga.,
to Rev. Martin Luther King Sr. and
Alberta Williams. He and his father
were actually both born as Michael
King, but his father changed both of
their names in 1934 to Martin Luther
after a trip to Germany, in honor of
the great German religious reformer
Martin Luther.
College Graduation
1948 -- The summer before
his last year at Morehouse,
in 1947, an 18-year-old King
made the choice to enter the
ministry after he concluded
the church offered the most
assuring way to answer “an
inner urge to serve humanity.”
King’s “inner urge” had begun
developing and he made peace
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.”
Marriage and Family
1953 -- King married Coretta Scott, on June 18, 1953 on the lawn of
her parents’ house in her hometown of Heiberger, Ala. They became
the parents of four children: Yolanda King (b. 1955), Martin Luther
King III (b. 1957), Dexter Scott King (b. 1961), and Bernice King (b.
1963).
Montgomery Bus Boycott
1955 -- Martin Luther King Jr. organized the Montgomery bus boycott
of 1955, which began a chain reaction of similar boycotts throughout
the South. The boycott came to national prominence when a black
seamstress named Rosa Parks refused to move from her seat on a bus.