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Martin Luther King Jr. Day luncheon Wednesday at Scott

  • Published
  • By Scott AFB Multicultural Committee
  • Scott AFB
SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, Ill --  Come and celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day with the Scott Air Force Base community and have lunch while learning about the many contributions Dr. King made to our great nation. The installation theme this year is "Yes We Can."

Following this theme, the Scott AFB Martin Luther King Jr. Day planning committee has scheduled a luncheon honoring Dr. King.

Martin Luther King, Jr., was a man of impressive moral presence who devoted his life to the fight for full citizenship rights of the poor, disadvantaged and racially oppressed in the United States. He was born Jan. 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Ga., he was the second of three children of the Rev. Michael (later Martin) and Mrs. Alberta Williams King. He received a Bachelor's Degree in Sociology (1948) from Morehouse College, another bachelor's degree (1951) from Crozer Theological Seminary and a Doctorate in Philosophy (1955) from Boston University.

In 1954, Dr. King accepted his first pastorate--the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Ala. He and his wife, Coretta Scott King, whom he had met and married in June 1953 while at Boston University, had been residents in Montgomery less than a year when Rosa Parks defied the ordinance concerning segregated seating on city buses. Dr. King's successful organization of the year-long Montgomery bus boycott, catapulted him into national prominence as a leader of the Civil Rights movement.

Dr. King studied the life and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi and further developed the Indian leader's doctrine of satyagraha ("holding to the truth"), or nonviolent civil disobedience. In the aftermath of Montgomery he traveled, delivered speeches and wrote his first book, Stride toward Freedom (1958). In 1960 he accepted co-pastorship with his father of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta and became president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Although he continued to travel and speak widely and firmly committed the SCLC to voter-registration campaigns throughout the South, Dr. King's major campaigns were those in Albany, Ga. (December 1961 through August 1962), Birmingham, Ala. (April through May 1963), and Danville, Va. (July 1963). He organized the massive March on Washington (Aug. 28, 1963) where, in his brilliant "I Have a Dream" speech, he "subpoenaed the conscience of the nation before the judgment seat of morality."

In January 1964, Time Magazine chose Dr. King as Man of the Year, the first African American so honored. Later that year he became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.

After supporting desegregation efforts in Saint Augustine, Fla., in 1964, Dr. King concentrated his efforts on the voter-registration drive in Selma, Ala., leading a harrowing march from Selma to Montgomery in March 1965. Soon after, a tour of the northern cities led him to assail the conditions of economic as well as social discrimination. This marked a shift in SCLC strategy, one intended to "bring the Negro into the mainstream of American life as quickly as possible." Having begun to recognize the deeper relationships of economics and poverty to racism, Dr. King now called for a "reconstruction of the entire society, a revolution of values." Along with demands for stronger civil and voting rights legislation and for a meaningful poverty budget, he spoke out against the Vietnam War. On April 4, 1967, he told an audience that "The Great Society [President Lyndon Johnson's antipoverty program] has been shot down on the battlefields of Vietnam."

Early in 1968, Dr. King began to plan a multiracial poor people's march on Washington to demand an end to all forms of discrimination and the funding of a $12 billion "Economic Bill of Rights." In the midst of organizing this campaign, he flew to Memphis, Tenn., to assist striking sanitation workers. There, on April 4, 1968, Dr. King was felled by an assassin's bullet. The violent death of this man of peace brought an immediate reaction of rioting in African American ghettos around the country. Although one man, James Earl Ray, was convicted of Dr. King's murder, the question of whether he was the paid agent of conspirators has not been conclusively resolved. It is clear only that the United States was deprived of a towering symbol of moral and social progress. Dr. King's birthday was declared a federal holiday in 1983.

The Scott AFB Multicultural Committee will host the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Commemorative Luncheon Wednesday from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Scott Club. Guest speaker for the luncheon will be retired Chief Master Sgt. Robert Dandridge.
Ticket prices are $9.51 for non-members or $8.93 for Scott Club members for London broil and $11.51 for non-members or $10.93 for Scott Club members for teriyaki chicken.
Tickets are on sale now and may be obtained from: Senior Master Sgt. Rongi Langham at 229-6697, Master Sgt. ReChell Hansen at 256-3608, Master Sgt. Connie Caldwell at 256-4149 or Tech. Sgt. Dierdre Vasquez at 229-3797.