Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site: Historic Resource Study
Blythe RW, Carroll MA, Moffson SH. 1994. Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site: Historic Resource Study. Cultural Resources Planning Division Southeast Regional Office, National Park Service. Atlanta, Georgia
Martin Luther King, Jr., is best known nationally and internationally for his leadership of the American Civil Rights Movement [1] and his subsequent efforts to promote world peace and economic equality. The Martin Luther King, Jr., National Historic Site, located in the historic east side Atlanta black community where King was reared and to which he later returned in the height of his activism, commemorates King's lifetime achievements. The Site preserves the King Birth Home and the immediate historic black neighborhood where King spent his youth. The larger "Sweet Auburn" community, which served as the economic, cultural, and religious center for Atlanta's segregated black population from 1910 through the 1960s, greatly influenced King both as a youth and as an adult.On January 15, 1929, Martin Luther King, Jr., was born in Atlanta at 501 Auburn Avenue within a prosperous black commercial and residential district. He lived in this house with his mother, father, grandparents, sister, brother, and an occasional boarder until he was twelve years old. King attended public schools nearby and walked to services at Ebenezer Baptist, where his maternal grandfather and father served as ministers. In 1941, the family moved to another house within the Auburn Avenue community, and King commuted to Atlanta University on the west side to attend high school classes. As an adult, King left Atlanta to attend Crozer Seminary, in Chester, Pennsylvania, near Philadelphia, and continued his education at Boston University. King led the members of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. while completing his doctorate in theology at Boston University. After serving in Montgomery for six years, King traveled to Atlanta to help organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957, and eventually moved to the city in 1960. The dominant force in the SCLC, King also co-pastored at Ebenezer Baptist Church in the Auburn Avenue community with his father.Few nationally significant civil rights activities occurred under King's mantle in Atlanta. However, King served upon the governing board of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), headquartered in Atlanta, participated in a lunch counter boycott at Rich's department store, a well-known Atlanta commercial establishment, and supported black Atlanta union members in a strike. King's best known and most effective civil protests occurred outside Atlanta, particularly in Alabama, where blacks wielded little economic, social, or political power.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Blythe, Robert; Carroll, Maureen; Moffson, Steven
- Date of Issue
- 1994-08
- Publisher
- Cultural Resources Planning Division Southeast Regional Office, National Park Service
- Units
- HIST , MALU
- Keywords
- Architectural Resources, Community, Development, ehistory, History, leadership, Management, Map, MLK, National Historic Site, resource study