Talk of the Town

By j.hernandez

April 3, 2008 11:57 AM | Link to this

yes I do! My mother and I flew down from New York a week after Dr. King’s funeral. The town was very quite and the people were pretty nice! We saw his grave site, it seem to be place in a lonley place!

By george

April 3, 2008 12:04 PM | Link to this

I was at work when I learned of Martin’s death. Towards the end of the day, the Principal made an announcement via intercom to inform students/staff of his death. The children were shocked and saddened by the anouncement. Special care was taken to ensure that all children were dismissed as routinely as possible. I listened to the radio on the way to my parents house to gather up my children. Along with my parents we explained to them what happened. The kids were familiar with Dr. King due to our involvement in the civil rights movement, as students and as a family. Later that week we took them to Auburn Avenue to see the crowds. We attended the funeral and went to Mrs. King’s home to visit with her and Mrs. Kennedy.

By George

April 3, 2008 12:17 PM | Link to this

I was almost 19 years old and a college freshman. I clearly remember when the news anchors broke in to make the announcement. However, I most clearly remember when Bobby Kennedy tried to calm potential violence by stating that his brother, John Kennedy, had also been killed. I remember him as being a heroic figure and a genuine hero along with Dr. King. I was very, very upset about Dr. King’s assassination but had come to expect it, due to his many, many death threats. Alas, Bobby himself had only 2 months to live himself before he too was the victim of an assassin.

By Mike Readey

April 3, 2008 12:23 PM | Link to this

I remember it well….I was a grade 8 student at St Thomas More School at the time….I was sitting with my mom in a restaurant in Lenox Square when the news broke….A total silence fell over the place. Looking back, I see the event as a turning point in the civil rights movement. Change seemed to move even faster after that. It is now 40 years later and the South is a totally different place, as is the entire country. I now live in Canada, in Nova Scotia, and here, too, there is a vibrant Black community who celebrate Dr. King just as enthusiastically. In fact,those who I know love hearing my stories of having been raised with a front row seat to the entire period in history.

By Ida Highsmith

April 3, 2008 12:27 PM | Link to this

I was 12 years old and I recall when the news broke on our black and white console TV that Martin Luther King, Jr. had died from his gunshots wounds. My entire household (my mother & Aunt) erupted in tears. I had never seen my mom cry before like she had done after walking the news report.I remember it was on a Thursday and I couldn’t understand until later in life how hurt my family felt. When I was about 8 years old, MLK Jr. came to Arlington, Virginia at Lomax Church and a neighbor took me and some other kids to see him speak. I will never forget the PRIDE I felt at a young age seeing Dr. King. At 12 I really didn’t have a good understanding or feel the full impact he had on the nation. I recall that my Uncle took my sister and I into Washington, DC corridor of 7th Street Northwest and surrounding area and we witnessed the looting/destruction that had taken place b/c of the death of Rev. King. Even though the fires/the police in riot gear/tear gas scared me as I was in my uncles car riding and looking-I’ll never forget the sad faces, and hurt that people felt during April1968. In hingsight, I now know my Uncle took me to DC to witness first hand and that part of history is still fresh in my mind. We as people still hurt and feel the ramficiations from his death. Amazing 40 years have gone by.

By OEStar68

April 3, 2008 12:28 PM | Link to this

I wasn’t born until December 1968, but growing up, I used to always look at the pictures my father took at the funeral and remember the good man we lost. The pics were in the family photo album so I always thought of Dr. King as one of my family members.

By Voice of Reason

April 3, 2008 12:44 PM | Link to this

I remember the evening well. My mother and I were in the Bronx at a department store, Alexander’s, when we heard the news.

For info about MLK’s Chief of Staff, go to the new site: [http://www.WyattTeeWalker.com]

By rlmccoy

April 3, 2008 1:14 PM | Link to this

I was working at a State Mental hospital in Staten Island, N.Y. at the time. The night before we were discussing Dr. King. One of the attendance said to us, why is he always having meetings and marching but no one ever attempt to kill him. She thought that he was working with the FBI. She also thought that he was very inconsiderate of the people that were following him. Because others were being killed and beaten and nothing ever happen to Dr. King. Well we tried to convince her that that was not the case at all. Then the next night we were sitting at work and of course the news came over the TV that Dr. King was killed. Of course I don’t think our co-worker ever got over making those remarks. I shed a tear each time I thank about it.

By Patrice

April 3, 2008 1:58 PM | Link to this

My mother was five months pregnant with me and she was telling me how sad everyone was and how that change history, i wish i could have met him but i was not born until July 26th 1968 He will always be the greatest man that ever live. Dr.King thank you for making things better for all of us!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

By Estelle Ford-Williamson

April 3, 2008 2:00 PM | Link to this

I was a reporter for United Press International in Atlanta when Martin Luther King, Jr. was struck down while leading a garbage workers strike in Memphis forty years ago Friday. I still recall the strike placards’ insistent message: “I am a MAN.” That plea for justice and Dr. King’s example of courage with clothes on resonate with me still after all this time. The death of King—from the wake and service to the long, emotional burial procession through downtown streets to Morehouse College—brought a maelstrom of attention to Atlanta. All the media were here, and the “big guns” from UPI New York and other bureaus filled the newsroom and the airwaves, as did the AP, the three major networks and global news outlets. I worked the UPI Georgia desk in a minor role—keep tabs on the police scanner, see what outbreaks of violence might be there to rush out and cover.
The violence never came. There were reports of windows breaking, some small events, but nothing like the bloodletting in Detroit, Chicago, and DC. In Chicago, in the Cabrini projects, not far from where I had lived post-college while taking journalism courses at Northwestern, a baby was shot dead in a crib. What was the world coming to that someone would shoot a baby? It was a time of such tremendous shock, hurt, and anger. When I heard the news of Bobby Kennedy’s death two months later, it was like someone had wrenched my guts out a second time. The relative quiet of Atlanta was amazing. Now I know that SCLC worked actively to make sure that King’s native city did not erupt. Hosea Williams publicly called for calm as a tribute to King. I can see Mayor Ivan Allen riding through neighborhoods to talk to residents, just as I later saw him walking with anti-Vietnam protesters to keep the peace around the state capitol. King could have never imagined the changes—good and bad—that have happened in Atlanta since he made the ultimate sacrifice for justice. And the city’s role as birthplace to King means that the focus has been on that legacy, in word and in deed. Some of us have wondered at how it translates to young people today. I personally have no fear for those coming up now, even if sometimes they get the 1960s and the 1860s confused when talking about historical events. (I tutored writing in college for seven years—I know whereof I speak! While meeting with students on their papers which frequently referenced King, I occasionally mentioned to my students that I had marched with Dr. King in Chicago in 1966, and heard him speak at Notre Dame prior to that. I’m sure I struck them as truly hoary stuff!) We have nothing to fear for our children’s memories, for King’s lessons of sacrifice have taken. Not too long ago, I had the opportunity to lead creative writing workshops for young people who were timing out of the foster care system in Georgia. They were preparing for life as adults even though their childhoods were marked by abandonment, poverty and emotional and other kinds of abuse. Some of these young people had had seven homes in one year, and some had been on the streets. During one of these courses, Coretta King died. The young men and women, black and white, were bereft. “Coretta’s gone. What are we gonna do?” they wailed. We worked on poetry and writings that expressed all their emotions. They wrote rap about King, about freedom and responsibility, about their futures, all delivered with fervor and a rap beat and all greeted by their peers as though they were American Idol contestants—whoops and hollers, whistles and thumping. I wrapped up the session with a drawing to give away some personal things—calendar/organizer, mugs, the book Seabiscuit. Among the things I’d decided I would like one of them to have was a Time-Life book I’d bought at the archives Coretta had set up on the AU campus at the International Theological Seminary right after King’s death. It was filled with speeches and press photos of King’s civil rights push. Given the copyright protections of King’s words, it was probably a valuable item (it bore the price tag: $1.98). I decided I needed to pass on the legacy. The young man who won was a tall, fair boy that I’ll call Jim. His rap about King and his impact on his life had won everyone’s approval. He had to compete with a young college-educated woman who’d recently joined the group and announced she collected Black History items. But the group wouldn’t let her have it—instead voted to let the home-grown white kid who hadn’t had a chance at college yet take it home. Jim’s left the transitional program now, and because of privacy laws, I’ll never be able to find out what happened to him. Does he have the book, look at it ever? Is he doing okay? I picture him looking at the book when life mounts a challenge. I picture him being inspired by the words, and by the courage that that life taken away gives us still today, forty years later.

By Nina

April 3, 2008 2:44 PM | Link to this

I was seven years old and living in New York at the time. I didn’t remember ever hearing about this great man before that day. I can see it as clear as if it happened yesterday: watching the events unfold on television after the assassination, the footage of the Lorraine Motel. My father was an assistant manager at a grocery store in Harlem, and he left that evening to make sure the store was secure because there was rioting everywhere—in most of the major cities at least. And then the funeral, I remember the regal and graceful Coretta Scott King and seeing the children and the horse-drawn casket and processional walking through the streets of Atlanta. And the tears of my mother and father. I didn’t quite understand all of it clearly as I did when I was older—yet I still remember the events during that troubling time. I also remember soon after when RFK was assassinated. My impression at that time as a young child was that that was the way of the world.

By BB

April 4, 2008 7:57 AM | Link to this

I will never forget this moment in my life! I am from Memphis and was 7 years old at the time. My mother was going to hear Dr. King speak that night. She brought all of her clothes to change into the living room so that she could stay by the Hi-Fi (stereo systems at that time) because she did not want to miss any of the coverage on his visit and speaking in Memphis that night. I was just hanging out in the living room listening to everything as well when a radio broadcast interrupted the program to announce that Dr. King had just been shot at the Lorraine Motel. My mother was just getting ready to step into a pair of slacks and when she hear that, she fell over onto the couch and cried into a pillow.

By John A. Jones

April 4, 2008 9:20 AM | Link to this

I was a twenty year old Junior at Morehouse College on April 4, 1968. I was attending our weekly movie at Sale Hall on that particular Thursday evening when suddenly the lights came on in the movie and a group of students,who were then considered radical, burst onto the stage and shouted, “They Have Killed Dr. King” Everyone, including myself were shocked, in disbelief, we slowly got up, most not talking, and walked out. The next few days were mayhem, sirens, somber music on radio station WAOK, WIGO for the remainder of the weekend. I remember standing with my girlfriend from Spelman days later on a grassy knoll in front of the chapel on the Atlanta University/ Morehouse College campus watching the thousands of people from all over the world as we watched the service for hours. That day I will never forget. “We Must Carry The Torch Forward for Dr. King”.

John A. Jones

By Debra

April 4, 2008 10:09 AM | Link to this

Oh my Lord! Yes I remember that day so clear; I can see the old brick 3 story apartment building that my family lived in in Gary, Indiana. My mother, my grandmother and I were the only ones at home at the time; we were on the main level of the building and when the news broke that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated my mother and grandmother cried out and the tears were just rolling. I was 9 years old and my first reaction was to find out what was wrong and why were the 2 women that I loved the most in the world, (that didn’t always agree upon everything)were embracing each other crying. I was already crying because they were crying and I knew it wasn’t good; I hadn’t heard a cry like that before; but when I really found out that the man that my grandmother had pictures of on the wall in her living room that she always talked to me about; how much he was doing for our country, our people, and trusted and loved like a brother was killed, it was like a family member had been taken away from us. I always asked grandma about him because I knew he was important because he was hanging up in a frame in her house along with God and J.F. Kennedy. The days was pretty much the same for at least a couple of weeks. We were mourning our extended family member in a sense and watched the news and listened to the radio every day. It was one of the saddest days I can remember; mostly because my mother and grandmother were much respected individuals in my life and I felt their pain even as a little girl, I didn’t understand everything about Dr. Kings movement at 9 years old,but I knew it was for my good and others. I made it a point of learning more about my grandmother’s teachings and Dr. King because if my “Grandma” said it, you could take it to the bank and cash it. Even now, when I hear Dr. King’s speeches, it sends chills of inspiration through my body of his vision for the world to be healed and I visualize my grandmother walking around doing chores, listening to Dr. King and amening him, praying for him and asking God for healing, unity, and love in our country. We’ve made some progress but it is obvious our work is not over. Rest In Peace Dr. King, Rest in Peace Grandma, and rest in Peace momma. God Bless America

By mp

April 4, 2008 10:49 AM | Link to this

I was 9 and I’ll never forget it. I was home sick and Momma was doing the family ironing. Suddenly she began crying. I was waking up from a dead sleep but I knew in my gut from the sound of her tears that something horrible had taken place. I remained silent as she held me and cried. Then I realized what had happened as the news unfolded. I was stunned but as most black people not completely surprised. Being murdered for speaking your beliefs was very, very common then and deep down even a 9 year old knew it was a matter of time before he would be taken from us. Thank you Dr. King for bringing us to our humanity. God willing we’ll keep it but it’s up to us.

By Chris

April 4, 2008 11:51 AM | Link to this

I was a junior in high school in Memphis at the time and remember the night vividlly. We had just finished dinner when it came over the TV that he had been shot. I immediately felt from the way they reported it that he would be dead. My first experience with assassination came with JFK at age 12 so I didn’t see how this could come out any better. Memphis was full of bigotry at the time (I am white)although I was not raised that way. Bussing had just occurred and at my High school, my class had maybe 6 black students in it. My parents were fair and impartial although my mother’s deep southern upbringing crept through from time to time. Like that night she commented “well look, he turned coward and ran at the first sign of violence” when they were marching downtown. It really made me angry as she didn’t have the first idea of what was going on and what she said was not true. Within 15 minutes, they came back on TV and announced he was dead. All I could think of was his young children. Within a day or two, the city was under curfew. The first night of curfew saw the armed guardsmen in the shopping centers where we shopped in East Memphis and by that evening, I was drawn to my bedroom window to see a tank going down my street patrolling the area which was like patrolling a quiet street in Roswell today. Going to school was tense and we were escorted to and from the building when arriving and leaving the school. Tense at the time, but glad to have been an eyewitness. Three months later, we traveled to Los Angeles to see my brother. He was a political science grad and working on his MBA at USC. He was going to take us to the Ambassador Hotel to see Bobby Kennedy make his victory speech for the CA primary win, but we were too tired to go. Bobby was truly my hero and remains so today. Needless to say, I am glad we were too tired to go. The next few days were the worst I can remember enduring, hoping he would live. The Spring of 1968 plays in my head like a movie every so often. A bad movie.

By Anita

April 4, 2008 12:08 PM | Link to this

I was 3 years old and I do remember the feeling of despair and sadness. I am surprised that I remember that I did not have a clue as to what was happening and why I felt so sad at the time or able to describe the fear I felt but I do honestly remember the screams and the tears and the saddness.from my mother and her sister it was nto on a television they received this news it was on a radio and that feeling I will never forget for the rest of my life.

By Llewelyn Barton

April 4, 2008 3:04 PM | Link to this

On April 4, 1968, I was a 19 year old student at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia. I was a Phi Beta Sigma sweetheart that year and April 4 was Sigma Day on Morehouse’s campus. The day started with chapel at 11am in Sale Hall, being serenaded by the brothers, lunch, dinner – the whole works. I was with the Sigma brothers in the lounge at one of the dorms when chaos broke out. Everyone on campus was in a state of hysteria!! Students were shouting, screaming and crying. The emotional tone was a mixture of pain and anger. Dr. King had been killed and he was one of our own.

The next morning, a Friday, Dean Chivers, the Spelman Dean of Students strongly suggested that we all leave the campus immediately and go home if we could. For a 19 year old, that was the signal to stay put. We heard later in the day that Dr. King’s body would lie in state in Sister’s Chapel from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning. The chapel was in a state of disarray because the pipe organ was being replaced. Dr. Grace Boggs Smith and Dr. Joyce Finch Johnson, two of my music teachers, went out and rented an organ and then took turns playing for the two days of the wake. The walls where construction was taking place were covered with black bunting. We were focused in on what was going on where we were and only vaguely paid attention to the reaction to Dr. King’s death around the country. We didn’t learn about the numerous threats to the campus until many weeks later. By Saturday afternoon, there were long lines of people waiting to pay their respects. We were amazed that by nightfall the lines were starting to wrap around all of the campus buildings 4 and 5 people deep. We circulated and took those people who needed to go to the bathroom to the dorms, fetched drinks of water, etc. Dr. King’s body was covered with a glass sheet to keep people from touching him. My roommate Cherry and friend Josetta stood over his body with rolls of paper towels and Windex to remove the fingerprints. By Sunday afternoon after church, the lines were around all of the buildings and out the front gate and over on Morehouse’s campus.

There was a private jet provided for any students who wanted to participate in the “I Am a Man” march in Memphis on Monday morning. I don’t quite remember why we didn’t go. This was one weekend where the strict Spelman rules weren’t being enforced. On Monday evening, we walked over on Morehouse’s campus and saw that they were setting up camera and other television equipment like none we had ever seen before.

Tuesday was the day of the funeral. We arrived early to claim a good position on the grounds that were between the Trevor Arnett Library and Graves Hall. The program took place on a platform built over the steps of Trevor Arnett. There were estimates that there were 200,000 people in attendance. When we heard the mule train was coming, we moved over to the gate next to Danforth Chapel. I was able to see Mrs. King, the children and the mule and wagon with Dr. King’s casket on it come through. Though it was the beginning of April, the temperature was nearly 90 degrees. We listened to speeches by all of the civil rights leaders of the day, prominent preachers, and politicians including Robert Kennedy. However, the person who most touched the crowd was Mahalia Jackson when she sang “Precious Lord, Take My Hand”. When she finished, people were crying buckets of tears and fainting. The other touching moment was the end where everyone on the lawn joined hands and sang “We Shall Overcome.” I have not been able to sing that song since then!!

By Vicki

April 5, 2008 6:50 PM | Link to this

I remember that day. I was 14 yrs. old and living in Detroit, Michigan. The Detroit Riots were that year and I could not understand what was going on at the time. We had just moved from NYC, so I knew little about Martin Luther King prior to our move. Living in Detroit I learned more and more about the Civil Rights Movement. Alot changed that year for me and many Black Americans. The deaths of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy changed many Americans. Never forget!

By Chuck Uga

April 6, 2008 12:19 AM | Link to this

I usually add commentary in the sports area, but this is an important time for all of us. For those who were not alive yet, I can relate to you the confusion of a 7-year old boy growing up in a white subdivision of Chattanooga (a city that experienced some vandalism and fires as a result of this tragic event). I can remember the chain-smoking mother of one of my classmates (from the special education school I was attending) rushing us home, scared to death that there would be violence on the interstate and streets before we could make it home safely. She would not even roll down the windows to keep us from breathing her nasty smoke. I didn’t understand what was happening or why. Two months later I witnessed on television the assassination of Robert Kennedy. All of this combined with Walter Cronkite’s nightly reports on soldiers dying in Vietnam. I can tell you that it breaks my heart to think of all the wonders and fun of my childhood (I had a good one) during such a terribly violent time in America…what irony. It is not uncommon for me to come to tears thinking of how blessed I was in the midst of the Vietnam War, Martin King’s assassination, Bobby Kennedy’s assassination, etc. It has greatly shaped my life as an adult as well as my religious principles. There is no way to properly repay the honor and sense of direction we received from Dr. King’s life, and I am thankful for the message he left us all…the principle taught by Christ himself to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. RIP Dr. King, you are an American hero.

By Political Foreskin

April 6, 2008 10:13 PM | Link to this

Top Three Greatest Americans of all time:

(1) Sitting Bull

(2) Lincoln

(3) MLK

to extend the list to the top ten, just to show what a jackass I am,

(4) JFK

(5) FDR

(6) IKE

(7) Marilyn Monroe

(8) John Lennon

(9) Tiger Woods

(10) Michael Jordan

By BossLady

April 7, 2008 2:17 PM | Link to this

Yes, I do remember. That day was the only time I actually saw my parents cry. It made me so afraid cause if they were this distraught then, I don’t know what to do.

It was as if they had changed right before my eyes. All I had known as a secure and comforting world,was not to be seen again, at least not the same way. As children we think our parents can do everything and solve everything. This, my friends, was a big one. Something, that they could not fix and something that they could not handle.

It was a day that changed my life.

By W.H. Durant

April 12, 2008 2:18 PM | Link to this

Like the earlier poster, John A. Jones, I was in Sale Hall at Morehouse College watching the movie (I’ve never been able to remember the title or anything about the plot) when the students came onto the stage and shouted that Dr. King had been shot and killed. Murmurs of disbelief swept across the room. The movie stopped, then resumed, but I think everyone was stunned and thinking about Dr. King. Someone then shouted out, asking why we were still sitting there when Dr. King was dead and something had to be done.

The night of the wake at Spelman, I remember sitting with my late brother and some other students on “The Wall,” an elevated vantage point on the AU side at the corner of Fair Street and what was then Chestnut Street (now James P. Brawley Drive). You could easily see who was coming and going to Spelman on what was then a two-way street, and we were there marveling at the long line of cars going to the wake. A guy who said his last name was King had been pontificating about the tragedy when a car with white people turned the corner. He shouted at them, threw something and they hurried off. Someone asked him why he did that, and he said he was mad. We wondered what he was doing on the corner with us, instead of being with his family, if he was indeed a member. I eventually walked down the street and got into the viewing line. I’d only seen Dr. King on TV, so I was struck by how short he was. I remember thinking it was his ideas, steadfast responses to reporters’ challenging and hostile questions, magnificent oratorical skills and dignified demeanor that had made him seem so tall.

On the day of the funeral, I remember the huge TV broadcast cables stretched across the campus grounds to the steps of Harkness Hall steps, the then-AU/Morehouse administration building where the event was to take place (not Trevor Arnett, which is the library). In the funeral procession, I was a parade marshal at the corner of Ashby (now Joseph E. Lowery Boulevard) and Fair streets. A female student from Clark (I’ve forgotten her name) and I were told to keep people back when the mule wagon turned the corner. We thought we could and, when the moment came, we stretched out our arms as we’d practiced. It worked for a few moments, but the large numbers of people behind pushed us towards the passing wagon and we just shrugged and smiled sheepishly at our futility. I think I saw Sammy Davis Jr. pass by. After the services began, I remember walking around thinking I’d never seen so many people in one place in all of my life, and that remains true to this day. I couldn’t get close enough to see what was going on, so I walked around looking at the people in the crowd. Some were crying. I remember seeing an elderly woman sitting under a tree. She was looking up at the sky and crying as though one of her own children had died. I thought how his appeal transcended generational lines and his words articulated the frustrations and hope we all had about society, especially for those who’ve experienced as much for so long as she.