It Wasn't Child's Play: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated as he stood on the balcony of the Loraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, April 4, 1968.  Born January 15, 1929, he was 39 years old upon his death.

I remember when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed.  I was very young, but I remember the sadness, tears, and anxiety that covered our neighborhood during that time. 

      

My parents, two older brothers and I were living on East 77^th Street right off Central Avenue in Los Angeles at the time.  It was a neighborhood filled with transplanted Black southerners who knew too well the horrors of segregation, discrimination, and the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).  They migrated from Georgia, Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama, and they feared and prayed for Dr. King’s health and welfare, supporting the civil rights movement progress with cautious optimism.

 

We lived in a working class neighborhood where families were the norm: two parents, kids, and for some, grandparents.  Our extended family lived within a three-block radius of our home. 

I can still see our neighbors and family members gathered in small groups, talking on their front lawns or talking at the curbside in hushed tones.  Everyone wore strained, confused and anxious expressions.  Men were talking loudly, angrily even, and being shushed by the women because kids were within earshot.  They killed Martin Luther King!  I see it all now in dream sequences.  It was April 4, 1968 and was real.

I wonder what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would think about our fractured families, incarcerated men, three military engagements on foreign shores, record Black unemployment, homelessness, dissolution of unions, technological dependence, violent tendencies, and social ineptness.  I could go on but I won’t.  It is April 4, 2011 and it is also real.

If you care to review the history of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr’s assassination, I found great archival coverage at this source:

Times Online UK http://tinyurl.com/3vd4xsj

Please support the building of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial in Washington, DC  here