By Rebecca Reed, CRM Executive

Martin Luther King Jr, born Michael King Jr on the 15th January 1929 was an American Baptist minister and activist who became the most evident spokesperson and leader in the civil rights movement. He became a civil rights activist early in his career. He led the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott and helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. In 1957 he served the SCLC as the first president. He helped organize the 1963 March on Washington where he delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.

In 1968, Martin Luther King Jr was planning a national occupation of Washington D.C. to be called the Poor Peoples Campaign, he was assassinated by James Earl Ray on April 4th in Memphis, Tennessee. His death was followed by riots in many U.S cities. Ray, fled the country and was arrested two months later at London Heathrow Airport, he was sentenced to 99 years in prison for Martin Luther King Jr’s murder and died in 1998 from hepatitis while serving his sentence.

Martin Luther King Jr Day was established as a holiday in numerous cities and states beginning in 1971 and as a U.S federal holiday in 1986/ There are hundreds of street across America that have been renamed in his honour and a county in Washington State was also renamed for him.