Martin Luther King Jr. was a very influential man in the civil rights movement. He was a preacher, an activist, and the president of the Southern Christian Leadership conference. In 1964 at the age of 35 MLK was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. On April 12th, 1963 MLK was jailed in Birmingham Alabama, while in jail he wrote “Letter from Birmingham Jail”. King was trying to teach others how to protest peacefully, until his assassination in 1968.
MLK was actually born as Micheal Luther King Jr on January 15th, 1929. He later changed his name to Martin. King attended a segregated public school and at the age of 15 King was accepted into Morehouse College, where he studied medicine and law. He later enrolled in the graduate program at Boston University. While in Boston he met Coretta Scott who would later become his wife. The couple settled in Montgomery Alabama, where King became the pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. Montgomery was a very segregated city, this is where king started his crusade and became a public figure for the civil rights movement.
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Rosa Parks was arrested for breaking the cities segregation laws. Martin Luther King Jr led peaceful boycotts in Montgomery until segregation on city buses finally ended. After the success of the boycott on the bus system, King became president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. While he was leader he traveled around the world tying to encourage African Americans to hold nonviolent protest for civil rights and voting rights as well. When an affiliate asked MLK to come to Birmingham Alabama he accepted the