King Remembered: Enduring Lessons from King

Dateline: April 4, 1968 - Radford, VA.

I was 10-years old and my sister, Karan, and I were playing outside in the front yard of our small home at 1325 StaplesStreet. It was a warm Spring day and we wanted to take advantage of every possible moment. My mother, Sybil Carter, swung open the front door of our white clapboard house and called to us, ordering us to come inside. As we approached we heard crying from inside and knew immediately that something terrible had happened.

My mother “did hair” and one of her customers, Mrs. Esterline Coles, sat with shoulders wrapped in a towel and her hair barely pressed. They were in the living room along with my three other sisters and they were glued to the small black and white television as news anchor Walter Cronkite delivered the stunning news:

“Dr. Martin Luther King, the Apostle of Non-Violence, has been shot to death in Memphis, Tennessee. Police have issued an All Points Bulletin for a well-dressed, young white man seen running from the scene. Police also reportedly chased and fired on a radio equipped car containing two white men. Dr. King was standing on the balcony of his second floor hotel room tonight, when according to a companion, a shot was fired from across the street. In the friend’s words, ‘the bullet exploded in his face.’”

“Oh my Lord!” My mother said. “What is poor Coretta gonna do with all those children?”

I looked up from the floor where I sat and watched as she gazed around the room at her brood of five children. She stopped briefly making eye contact with me, and imagined how, the now widow, was going to make it.

I didn’t sleep well that night. The words of the veteran newsman stuck in my head and the pictures of the violence that had erupted across the country made me fear that the same would happen in our little town. At age 10, it was difficult to comprehend the magnitude of what was happening since the name Martin Luther King was often heard in our home; usually accompanied by words like hope change and one day. Integration was only a couple years old in our predominately white city and racial tensions remained. An uneasiness existed from the schools to the neighborhoods.

From that moment on, this little black boy from a small southern town could not have possibly predicted what his life now would be like. Nor did he know that Dr. King’s story would take on tremendous personal meaning and have such a profound impact on his future. I lived through the turbulent 60’s –a decade marred by violence which framed the painful transformation of America. This boy would go on to college and have civil rights struggles of his own, only to find himself eventually in Atlanta, Georgia in the company of those leaders who shaped and orchestrated “The Movement.” These were the very same people he watched on television in countless news conferences and interviews extolling the works and words of Martin. They talked of that better day and what changes needed to be made to bring about equality and justice for the least of these Americans and here I was, face-to-face with the history makers - a long way from Staples Street.

The men of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. were ever present in the Civil Rights Movement and they made sure that anyone they came in contact with, understood the context, and learned the lessons of those who were on the front lines.

“A Charge to Keep”

It has been 50 years since the death of a man who greatly influenced the enactment of laws offering various protections for a people. But yet in those 50 years, America has not kept pace with ‘the Dream.’ It is still riddled with the vestiges of what Martin fought against. Voting rights continue to be threatened as new laws are passed to have a chilling effect on those who desire to vote. America’s landscape is dotted by city schools that remain primarily one race or another - and there are equitable differences that leave a child’s education hanging in the balance. People are still being profiled or denied access when they attempt to shop in stores. Some law enforcements - charged with a mandate to protect and serve - stop certain citizens without cause and corrupt the badge and diminish trust. Some people have little to no access to health care and are deprived of life saving treatments. That same population are still judged by the color of their skin and the content of their character is never taken into consideration. People are still told where to go, what to buy, where to live, and whom to love.

So was it worth it? For some, ‘the Dream’ is a nightmare from which they cannot wake.