Martin Luther King Jr

Dr. King was born on January 15, 1929 in Atlanta Georgia. He was an ordained Baptist minister and civil rights activist. Dr. King played the major role in ending the legal segregation of African-American citizens in the south and the rest of the nation. In 1964 Dr. King received the Nobel Peace Prize for his part in the creation of the Civil Rights Act of 1965 and his influence on the voting Right Act of 1965. Dr. King's I Have a Dream speech is always referred to when talking of Dr. King's talents.
Dr. King's father, Michael King Sr. became pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in 1931. He was a successful minister and felt racism and segregation was an affront to God's ill. He discouraged all impressions of class superiority and left this impression on Dr. King.
Dr. King earned a sociology degree from Morehouse College and went on to attend Crozer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania. He did well and earned a fellowship for graduate study. During school he rebelled and became involved with a white woman, drink and partying. He came under the tutelage of Reinhold Niebuhr which influenced Dr. King's intellectual and spiritual development. King enrolled at Boston University to obtain a doctorate. King and Coretta Scott married in June of 1953 and they had four children. In 1954 King became minister of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church of Montgomery Alabama. He was only 25 years old when he received his Ph.D. degree in 1955.
King was successful in the bus boycott of the 1950s, and lifting the segregation order of Brown v. Board of Education. King and Ralph Abernathy plus 60 other ministers founding the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957. They conducted non-violent protests to promote civil rights. King participated in sponsoring meetings to open up the vote for African Americans.
In 1963 King and his followers marched on Washington. In the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial King made his famous I Have a Dream speech. King's non-violent attitudes soon began to be changed by younger blacks who wanted violent actions. King became discouraged at the slow progress of civil rights in America. In a speech in April of 1968 King promised supporters he would travel to the Promised Land. On April 5, 1968 he was assassinated by an assistant's bullet administered by James Earl Ray.