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Chronology of
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
1929
January 15
Martin Luther King, Jr. is born to Rev. and Mrs. Martin Luther King,
Sr. (former Alberta Christine Williams) in Atlanta, Georgia.
1935 – 1944
Dr. King attends David T. Howard Elementary School, Atlanta University
Laboratory School, and Booker T. Washington High
School. He passes the entrance examination to Morehouse College in Atlanta,
Georgia without graduating from high school.
1947
Dr. King is licensed to preach.
1948
February 25
Dr. King is ordained to the Baptist ministry and appointed associate
pastor at Ebenezer.
June 8
Dr. King graduates from Morehouse College with a BA degree in Sociology.
September
Dr. King enters Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania.
After hearing Dr. A. J. Muste and Dr. Mordecai W. Johnson preach on the
life and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi, he begins to study Gandhi seriously.
1951
May 6-8
Dr. King graduates from Crozer with a Bachelor of Divinity degree.
1953
June 18
Dr. King marries Coretta Scott in Marion, Alabama.
1954
May 17
The Supreme Court of the United States rules unanimously in Brown vs.
Board of Education that racial segregation in public schools is unconstitutional.
October 31
Rev. Martin Luther King, Sr. appoints Dr. King as the twentieth pastor
of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama.
1955
June 5
Dr. King receives a Ph.D. degree in Systematic Theology from Boston University.
November 17
The Kings’ first child, Yolanda Denise, is born in Montgomery, Alabama.
December 1
Mrs. Rosa Parks, a forty-two year old Montgomery seamstress, refuses
to relinquish her bus seat to a white man and is arrested.
December 5
The first day of the Montgomery bus boycott and the trial date of Mrs.
Parks. A meeting of movement leaders is held. Dr. King is unanimously
elected president of the Montgomery Improvement Association.
December 10
The Montgomery Bus Company suspends service in black neighborhoods.
1956
January 26
Dr. King is arrested on a charge of traveling thirty miles per hour in
a twenty-five miles per hour zone in Montgomery. He is released on his
own recognizance.
January 30
A bomb is thrown onto the porch of Dr. King’s Montgomery home. Mrs.
King and Mrs. Roscoe Williams, wife of a church member, are in the house
with baby Yolanda Denise. No one is injured.
February 2
A suit is filed in Federal District Court asking that Montgomery’s
travel segregation laws be declared unconstitutional.
February 21
Dr. King is indicted with other figures in the Montgomery bus boycott
on the charge of being party to a conspiracy to hinder and prevent the
operation of business without “just or legal cause.”
June 4
A United States District Court rules that racial segregation on city
bus lines is unconstitutional.
August 10
Dr. King is a speaker before the platform committee of the Democratic
Party in Chicago, Illinois.
October 30
Mayor Gayle of Montgomery, Alabama instructs the city’s legal department
“to file such proceedings as it may deem proper to stop the operation
of car pools and transportation systems growing out of the boycott.”
November 13
The United States Supreme Court affirms the decision of the three-judge
district court in declaring Alabama’s state and local laws requiring
segregation on buses unconstitutional.
December 20
Federal injunctions prohibiting segregation on buses are served on city
and bus company officials in Montgomery, Alabama. Injunctions are also
served on state officials.
ontgomery buses are integrated.
1957
January 27
An unexploded bomb is discovered on the front porch of the King’s
house.
February 14
The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) is founded.
February 18
Dr. King is featured on the cover of Time magazine.
May 17
Dr. King delivers a speech for the Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom celebrating
the third anniversary of the Supreme Court’s desegregation decision.
The speech, titled, “Give Us The Ballot,” is given at the Lincoln
Memorial in Washington, D.C.
June 13
Dr. King meets with the Vice President of the United States, Richard
M. Nixon.
September
President Dwight D. Eisenhower federalizes the Arkansas National Guard
to escort nine Negro students to an all-white high school in Little Rock,
Arkansas.
September 9
The first Civil Rights Act since Reconstruction is passed by Congress,
creating the Civil Rights Commission and the Civil Rights Division of
the Department of Justice.
October 23
A second child, Martin Luther III, is born to Dr. and Mrs. King.
1958
June 23
Dr. King, along with Roy Wilkins of the NAACP, A. Philip Randolph, and
Lester Granger meet with President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
September 3
Dr. King is arrested on a charge of loitering (later changed to “failure
to obey an officer”) in the vicinity of the Montgomery Recorder’s
Court. He is released on $100.00 bond.
September 4
Dr. King is convicted after pleading “Not Guilty” on the charge
of failure to obey an officer. The fine is paid almost immediately, over
Dr. King’s objection, by Montgomery Police Commissioner Clyde C.
Sellers.
September 17
Dr. King’s book, Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, is
published by Harper & Row.
September 20
Dr. King is stabbed in the chest by Mrs. Izola Curry, who is subsequently
alleged to be mentally deranged. The stabbing occurs in Harlem, New York
while Dr. King is autographing his recently published book. His condition
was said to be serious but not critical.
1959
January 30
Dr. King meets with Walter Reuther, President of the United Auto Workers
Union, in Detroit, Michigan.
February 2 - 10
Dr. and Mrs. King spend a month in India studying Gandhi’s March
techniques of nonviolence as guests of Prime Minister Jawaharal Nehru.
1960
January 24
The King family moves to Atlanta, Georgia. Dr. King becomes co-pastor,
with his father, of the Ebenezer Baptist Church.
February 1
The first lunch counter sit-in to desegregate eating facilities is held
by students in Greensboro, North Carolina.
February 17
A warrant is issued for Dr. King’s arrest on charges that he had
falsified his 1956 and 1958 Alabama state income tax returns.
April 15
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) is founded to coordinate
student protests at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina on a temporary
basis. (It is to become a permanent organization in October 1960.) Dr.
King and James Lawson are the keynote speakers at the Shaw University
founding.
May 28
Dr. King is acquitted of the tax evasion charge by an all white jury
in Montgomery, Alabama.
June 10
Dr. King and A. Philip Randolph announce plans for picketing both the
Republican and Democratic National Conventions.
June 24
Dr. King meets with John F. Kennedy (candidate for President of the United
States) about racial matters.
October 19
Dr. King is arrested at an Atlanta sit-in and is jailed on a charge of
violating the state’s trespassing law.
October 22 - 27
The trespassing charges are dropped. All jailed demonstrators are released
except Dr. King, who is held on a charge of violating a probated sentence
in a traffic arrest case. He is transferred to the Dekalb County Jail
in Decatur, Georgia, and is then transferred to the Reidsville State Prison.
He is released from the Reidsville State Prison on a $2,000.00 bond.
1961
January 30
A third child, Dexter Scott, is born to Dr. and Mrs. King in Atlanta,
Georgia.
May 4
The first group of Freedom Riders, with the intent of integrating interstate
buses, leaves Washington, D.C. by Greyhound bus. The group, organized
by the Congress for Racial Equality (CORE), leaves shortly after the Supreme
Court has outlawed segregation in interstate transportation terminals.
The bus is burned outside of Anniston, Alabama on May 14. A mob beats
the Freedom Riders upon their arrival in Birmingham, Alabama. The Freedom
Riders are arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, and spend forty to sixty
days in Parchman Penitentiary.
December 15
Dr. King arrives in Albany, Georgia in response to a call from Dr. W.
G. Anderson, the leader of the Albany Movement to desegregate public facilities,
which began in January 1961.
December 16
Dr. King is arrested at an Albany, Georgia demonstration. He is charged
with obstructing the sidewalk and parading without a permit.
1962
February 27
Dr. King is tried and convicted for leading the December march in Albany,
Georgia.
May 2
Dr. King is invited to join the protests in Birmingham, Alabama.
July 27
Dr. King is arrested at an Albany, Georgia city hall prayer vigil and
jailed on charges of failure to obey a police officer, obstructing the
sidewalk and disorderly conduct.
September 20
James Meredith makes his first attempt to enroll at the University of
Mississippi. He is actually enrolled by Supreme Court order and is escorted
onto the Oxford, Mississippi campus by U.S. Marshals on October 1, 1962.
October 16
Dr. King meets with President John F. Kennedy at the White House for
a one-hour conference.
1963
March 28
The King’s fourth child, Bernice Albertine, is born.
March-April
Sit-in demonstrations are held in Birmingham, Alabama to protest segregation
of eating facilities. Dr. King is arrested during a demonstration.
April 16
Dr. King writes the “Letter From A Birmingham Jail” while imprisoned
for demonstrating.
May 3 - 5
Eugene “Bull” Connor, Director of Public Safety of Birmingham,
Alabama, orders the use of police dogs and fire hoses against the marching
protesters, including young adults and children.
May 20
The Supreme Court of the United States rules Birmingham, Alabama’s
segregation ordinances unconstitutional.
June
Dr. King’s book, Strength To Love, is published by Harper &
Row.
June 11
Governor George C. Wallace tries to stop the court ordered integration
of the University of Alabama by “standing in the schoolhouse door”
and personally refusing entrance to black students and Justice Department
officials. President John F. Kennedy then federalizes the Alabama National
Guard, and Governor Wallace removes himself from blocking the entrance
of the Negro students.
June 12
Medgar Evers, NAACP leader in Jackson, Mississippi, is assassinated
at his home in the early morning darkness. His memorial service
is held in Jackson on June 15. He is buried in Arlington National
Cemetery, Washington D.C. on June 19.
August 28
The March on Washington, the first large-scale integrated protest march,
is held in Washington, D.C. Dr. King delivers his “I Have A Dream”
speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Afterwards he and other Civil
Rights leaders meet with President John F. Kennedy in the White House.
September 2-10
Governor Wallace orders the Alabama state troopers to stop the court
ordered integration of Alabama’s elementary and high schools until
he is enjoined by court injunction from doing so. By September 10 specific
schools are actually integrated by court order.
September 15
Four young girls are killed in a Birmingham, Alabama church bombing.
November 22
President Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas, Texas.
1964
Summer
COFO (Council of Federated Organizations) initiates the Mississippi Summer
Project, a voter registration drive organized and run by black and white
students.
May - June
Dr. King joins other SCLC workers in a demonstration for the integration
of public accommodations in St. Augustine, Florida. He is jailed.
June
Dr. King’s book, Why We Can’t Wait, is published by Harper
& Row.
June 21
Three civil rights workers, James Chaney (black), Andrew Goodman and
Michael Schwerner (both white), are reported missing after a short trip
to Philadelphia, Mississippi.
July 2
Dr. King attends the signing of the Public Accommodations Bill, (Part
of the Civil Rights Act of 1964) by President Lyndon B. Johnson in the
White House.
July 18-23
Riots occur in Harlem, New York. One black man is killed.
August
Riots occur in New Jersey, Illinois and Pennsylvania.
August 4
The bodies of civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and
Michael Schwerner are discovered by FBI Agents buried near the town of
Philadelphia, Mississippi. Neshoba County Sheriff Rainey and his deputy,
Cecil Price, are allegedly implicated in the murders.
September
Dr. King and Rev. Ralph Abernathy visit West Berlin at the invitation
of Mayor Willy Brandt.
September 18
Dr. King has an audience with Pope Paul VI at the Vatican.
December 10
Dr. King receives the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway.
1965
February 21
Malcolm X, leader of the Organization of Afro-American Unity and former
Black Muslim leader, is murdered in New York City.
March 7
A group of marching demonstrators (from SNCC and SCLC) led by SCLC’s
Hosea Williams are beaten when crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge on their
planned march to Montgomery, Alabama, from Selma, Alabama. Their attackers
were state highway patrolmen under the direction of Al Lingo and sheriff’s
deputies under the leadership of Jim Clark. An order by Governor Wallace
had prohibited the march.
March 9
Unitarian minister, James Reeb, is beaten by four white segregationists
in Selma. He dies two days later.
March 15
President Johnson addresses the nation and Congress. He describes the
voting rights bill he will submit to Congress in two days and uses the
slogan of the Civil Rights Movement, “We Shall Overcome.”
March 16
Sheriff’s deputies and police on horseback in Montgomery, Alabama
beat black and white demonstrators.
March 21 – 25
Over three thousand protest marchers leave Selma for a march to Montgomery,
Alabama protected by federal troops. They are joined along the way by
a total of twenty-five thousand marchers. Upon reaching the capitol, they
hear an address by Dr. King.
March 25
Mrs. Viola Liuzzo, wife of a Detroit Teamsters Union business agent,
is shot and killed while driving a carload of marchers back to Selma.
July
Dr. King visits Chicago, Illinois. SCLC joins with the Coordinating Council
of Community Organizations (CCCO), led by Al Raby, in the Chicago Project.
August - December
In Alabama, SCLC spearheads voter registration campaigns in Green and Wilcox
counties, and in the cities of Montgomery, Birmingham, and Eutaw, Alabama.
August 6
The 1965 Voting Rights Act is signed by President Johnson.
August 11-16
In Watts, the black ghetto of Los Angeles, riots leave a total of thirty-five
dead. Twenty-eight are black.
1966
February
Dr. King rents an apartment in the black ghetto of Chicago, Illinois.
February 23
Dr. King meets with Elijah Muhammad, leader of the Black Muslims, in
Chicago.
March
Dr. King takes over a Chicago slum building and is sued by its owner.
March 25
The Supreme Court of the United States rules all poll tax unconstitutional.
Spring
Dr. King tours Alabama to help elect black candidates.
The Alabama Primary is held, and for the first time since Reconstruction,
blacks vote in significant numbers.
May 16
An antiwar statement by Dr. King is read at a large Washington rally
to protest the war in Vietnam. Dr. King agrees to serve as a co-chairman
of Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam.
June
Stokely Carmichael and Willie Ricks (SNCC) use the slogan “Black
Power” in public for the first time before reporters in Greenwood,
Mississippi.
June 6
James Meredith is shot soon after beginning his 220-mile “March
Against Fear” from Memphis, Tennessee to Jackson, Mississippi.
July 10
Dr. King launches a drive to make Chicago an “open city” regarding
housing.
August 5
Dr. King is stoned in Chicago as he leads a march through crowds of angry
whites in the Gage Park section of Chicago’s southwest side.
September
SCLC launches a project with the aim of integrating schools in Grenada,
Mississippi.
Fall
SCLC initiates the Alabama Citizen Education Project in Wilcox County.
1967
January
Dr. King writes his book Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?
while in Jamaica.
March 12
Alabama is ordered to desegregate all public schools.
March 25
Dr. King attacks the government’s Vietnam policy in a speech at
the Chicago Coliseum.
April 4
Dr. King makes a statement about the war in Vietnam, “Beyond Vietnam,”
at the Riverside Church in New York City.
May 10-11
One black student is killed in a riot on the campus of all Negro Jackson
State College in Jackson, Mississippi.
July 6
The Justice Department reports that more than 50 percent of all eligible
black voters are registered in Mississippi, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana
and South Carolina.
July 12-17
Twenty-three people die and 725 are injured in riots in Newark, New Jersey.
July 23-30
Forty-three die and 324 are injured in the Detroit riots -- the worst
of the century.
July 26
Black leaders, Martin Luther King, Jr., A. Philip Randolph, Roy Wilkins
and Whitney Young appeal for an end to the riots, “which have proved
ineffective and damaging to the civil rights cause and the entire nation.”
October 30
The Supreme Court upholds the contempt-of-court convictions of Dr. King
and seven other black leaders who led the 1963 marches in Birmingham,
Alabama. Dr. King and his aides enter jail to serve four-day sentences.
November 27
Dr. King announces the formation by SCLC of a Poor People’s Campaign,
with the aim of representing the problems of poor blacks and whites.
1968
February 12
Sanitation workers strike in Memphis, Tennessee.
March 28
Dr. King leads six thousand protesters on a march through downtown Memphis
in support of striking sanitation workers. Disorder breaks out during
which black youths loot stores. One sixteen-year-old is killed and fifty
people are injured.
April 3
Dr. King’s last speech titled “I’ve Been to the Mountain Top” is
delivered at Mason Temple in Memphis, Tennessee.
April 4
Dr. King is assassinated as he stands talking on the balcony of his second-floor
room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. He dies in St. Joseph’s Hospital
from a gunshot wound in the neck.
April 9
Dr. King is buried in Atlanta, Georgia.
June 5
Presidential candidate Senator Robert Kennedy is shot in Los Angeles
and dies the next day.
1986
January 18
Following passage of Public Law 98-144, President Ronald Reagan signs
a proclamation declaring the third Monday in January of each year a public
holiday in honor of the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.
1999
December 8
A jury of twelve citizens of Memphis, Shelby
County, TN concluded in Coretta Scott King, Martin Luther King,
III, Bernice King, Dexter Scott King and Yolanda King Vs. Loyd Jowers
and Other Unknown Conspirators that Loyd Jowers and governmental
agencies including the City of Memphis, the State of Tennessee,
and the federal government were party to the conspiracy to assassinate
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
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