Martin Luther King Jr.

Described as

American Baptist minister and civil rights leader (1929–1968)

Other names

M.L. King, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Michael King Jr., Martin Luther King, Martin Luther King, Jr., Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., MLK, Dr. King, Martin Luther King Junior, Michael King Junior, The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., M. L. King

Born

January 15, 1929 · 17 references

Died

April 4, 1968 · 17 references

Born in

Atlanta · 3 references

Died in

St. Joseph's Hospital · 2 references

Buried in

Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park

Cause of death

gunshot wound

Name at birth

Michael King Jr.

Citizen of

United States

Occupation

pastor · 1 reference; preacher; civil rights advocate · 1 reference; peace activist · 1 reference; pacifist; writer · 2 references; politician · 1 reference; opinion journalist · 1 reference

Worked for

Dexter Avenue Baptist Church; Ebenezer Baptist Church; Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam · 1 reference

Education

Morehouse College (1944–1948); Crozer Theological Seminary (1948–1951); Boston University (1951–1955); Washington High School; Boston University School of Theology; David T. Howard High School

Member of

American Academy of Arts and Sciences; Southern Christian Leadership Conference; Alpha Phi Alpha; Progressive National Baptist Convention

Awards

Nobel Peace Prize (1964) · 2 references; Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding (1966); United Nations Prize in the Field of Human Rights (1978); Gandhi Peace Award (1964); Pacem in Terris Award (1965); Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards (1959); Margaret Sanger Awards (1966); Time Person of the Year (1963); Presidential Medal of Freedom (1977) · 1 reference; Congressional Gold Medal (2004); Humanitarian of the Year (1984) · 1 reference; Order of the Companions of O. R. Tambo · 1 reference; Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; Spingarn Medal (1957) · 1 reference; honorary doctor of the Hofstra University

Field

political activity · 1 reference; civil rights · 1 reference; racism · 1 reference; racial segregation · 1 reference; peace movement · 1 reference; politics · 1 reference

Spouse

Coretta Scott King (1953–1968) · 1 reference

Children

Yolanda King; Martin Luther King III; Dexter Scott King · 1 reference; Bernice King

Father

Martin Luther King Sr. · 1 reference

Mother

Alberta Williams King

Siblings

Christine King Farris; A. D. King

Religion

Baptists

Height

1.76 m (5 ft 9 in) · 1 reference

Website

https://thekingcenter.org · 1 reference

Wikipedias with a page

252

Wikidata item Q8027 (wikidata.org/wiki/Q8027), public domain (CC0). Copied November 13, 2026.

Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American civil rights activist and Baptist minister who was a prominent leader of the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. He advanced civil rights in the United States through the use of nonviolence and sometimes civil disobedience against Jim Crow laws and other forms of legalized discrimination, which most commonly affected African Americans.
A Black church leader, King participated in and led marches for the right to vote, desegregation, labor rights, and other civil rights. He oversaw the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott and was the first president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), leading the unsuccessful Albany Movement in Albany, Georgia, and helping organize nonviolent 1963 protests in Birmingham, Alabama. King was one of the leaders of the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech, and helped organize two of the three Selma to Montgomery marches during the 1965 Selma voting rights movement. There were dramatic standoffs with segregationist authorities, who often responded violently. The civil rights movement achieved pivotal legislative gains in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968.
King was jailed several times. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director J. Edgar Hoover considered King a radical and made him an object of COINTELPRO from 1963. FBI agents investigated him for possible communist ties, spied on his personal life, and secretly recorded him. In 1964, the FBI mailed King a threatening anonymous letter, which he interpreted as an attempt to make him commit suicide. King won the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize for combating racial inequality through nonviolent resistance. In his final years, he expanded his focus to include opposition towards poverty and the Vietnam War.
In 1968, King was planning a national occupation of Washington, D.C., to be called the Poor People's Campaign, when he was assassinated on April 4 in Memphis, Tennessee. James Earl Ray was convicted of the assassination, though it remains the subject of conspiracy theories. King's death led to riots in US cities. King was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977 and Congressional Gold Medal in 2003. Martin Luther King Jr. Day was established as a holiday in cities and states throughout the United States beginning in 1971; the federal holiday was first observed in 1986. The Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was dedicated in 2011.

Born, in its opening lines

January 15, 1929

Died, in its opening lines

April 4, 1968

From the Wikipedia article “Martin Luther King Jr.” (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King_Jr.), by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Copied November 13, 2026; not changed.