To honor the life and work of the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968)
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.” ~ Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Read entire I Have A Dream speech here or listen to the audio from Internet Archives
Not only did the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. deliver one of the most powerful speeches of all time, in 1964, he became the youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to end racial segregation and racial discrimination through civil disobedience and other non-violent means.
His biography on Nobelprize.org gives insight into Dr. King’s ideals and level of commitment. It also gives us an idea of the stamina he must of had to keep up with the incredible amount of work he did as he set out to make this world a better place.
In 1957 he was elected president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization formed to provide new leadership for the now burgeoning civil rights movement. The ideals for this organization he took from Christianity; its operational techniques from Gandhi. In the eleven-year period between 1957 and 1968, King traveled over six million miles and spoke over twenty-five hundred times, appearing wherever there was injustice, protest, and action; and meanwhile he wrote five books as well as numerous articles. In these years, he led a massive protest in Birmingham, Alabama, that caught the attention of the entire world, providing what he called a coalition of conscience. and inspiring his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”, a manifesto of the Negro revolution; he planned the drives in Alabama for the registration of Negroes as voters; he directed the peaceful march on Washington, D.C., of 250,000 people to whom he delivered his address, “l Have a Dream”, he conferred with President John F. Kennedy and campaigned for President Lyndon B. Johnson; he was arrested upwards of twenty times and assaulted at least four times; he was awarded five honorary degrees; was named Man of the Year by Time magazine in 1963; and became not only the symbolic leader of American blacks but also a world figure.
By the time of his death in 1968, he had refocused his efforts on ending poverty and opposing the Vietnam War, both from a religious perspective. Dr. King was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977 and Congressional Gold Medal in 2004.
Source: Wikipedia
And, remember…Feed Your Good Dog, so your good dog always wins!
On this Memorial Day 2014, we salute America’s fallen heroes and their families who gave the ultimate sacrifice in defense of our country for freedom and opportunity. We are humbled by your sacrifice.