In Black America; Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Even if there isn't one or the least common, Besides a richer, True is the outta here in this library. Just engrave elements that can give this Martin Luther King III is the second of four King children, two of whom are sons. Known to his friends as martyr, he was only ten when his father, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in April of 1968. He remembers the great civil rights leader as daddy, a caring, loving father who often took him swimming and biking.

Filling the shoes of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is a difficult task, perhaps an impossible one. That's why Marty is continuing in his father's tradition while charting his own course rather than picking up where daddy left off. This week, Martin Luther King III in Black America. From the Center for Telecommunication Services, the University of Texas at Austin, this is in Black America, discussions of the Black Experience and Contemporary Society. With this week's program, here's your producer and host, John Henson. Being the son of the famous civil rights leader is both a blessing and a hassle. Marty King, the eldest son and namesake of the late civil rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is trying to do what is right in his heart. There are those who urge him to run for political office, others have offered to finance his

campaign or serve as campaign manager. Marty is trying to establish his own identity and determine his goals in life. Despite the pressures of being the son of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Marty King is coming into his own. He is concerned about the poor and oppressed and is becoming more vocal about the lack of direction of Black youth. Marty is a popular speaker on college campuses, at churches, and at rallies for various causes. Marty, an articulate and determined young man, gives one a feeling that he will certainly do what is right. With a man of a gracious southern preacher, Marty's conversation is punctuated with quotes from his father and references to the Bible. Religion is a major influence in his life. Marty says if the Lord calls him to the ministry, he's ready. In the meantime, he's busy preparing himself for his yet uncertain mission in life. He is currently a manager trainee at a major hotel in Atlanta.

People have always tried to say that, or ask, is it a burden, especially carrying the name of one who society knows relatively well? I really think it's a blessing in many senses, and I say that because to walk amongst and be amongst greatness is something that we don't get to do all the time. It's hard for me to talk about it because I have to look at Martin Luther King Jr. as a father who is daddy to me, and then I have to also look at him as the great person that society looked to him as, and I guess continues to look to him because of his phenomenal vision that one day we would live in a world where we would, and the man would, well, particularly blacks would not be judged, or his children would not be judged by the color of their skin,

or by the content of their character, as well as living in a world where we would not have to destroy person or property, and we have to embrace these principles, which are the principles of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ more and more, as life goes on because times and more, there's no other time in history of this nation that we could embrace these principles more than at this time, I feel. What have you been doing since your father's death to keep his dream alive? Well I've done, I guess, a host of things. First of all, of course, I was very young, one of my father was taking away, I was, I guess, about 10 years old, of course I went on through high school and then attended Morehouse College, graduating in 1979 with a BA in the political science. After acquiring that degree, or as a matter of fact, doing that same year in 1979, I worked for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, actually maybe 78 in 79, as a public participation

specialist. Well after that, I worked for the Carter administration, and I've done a host of things throughout my life, like in 1977, I worked on the film with Paul Winfield and Sisley Tyson called King. It was an Abbey Man film, and Paul Winfield played my father, Sisley Tyson, my mother, and I was like a technical advisor to the film. Then I worked in the Carter election in 1976 a little bit, and then in 80 I worked even more diligently. Then also I've done a host of voter registration drives, and also in 80 I became a full-time staff person, a consultant for the Carter campaign committee. After 80 I counted it a lot of public speaking in terms of lecturing on college campuses and churches, and then now I worked for the Dunphy Atlanta hotel, in personnel department. I went through a management training program, which was a year.

Now I'll be lent out by Dunphy to the City of Atlanta for six months to work in an economic development, all along I've been doing a host of things, and fundraising for the modern Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, which is the organization established by the King family to continue and institutionalize my father's work and dream. We have over the documents in our archives, which is one of the sections and one of the programs that the center has, the center has about ten basic programs. There's a reading academy teaching people to become functionally literate. There is, let's see, a research component that goes into areas, research is a problem, acquires the funding, allocates the funding, oversees the project until it's completion. Then we have an internship program, scholars internship program for college students, where you come and you do nonviolent study for two weeks and a nonviolent orientation. After that two-week period, you're eight weeks in the field and then a week of evaluation

where you write a paper and you get about ten hours credit. That's another program. Then we have a daycare center where you bring all types of kids in and basically from deprived areas and you pay according to what you make, some persons pay nothing. You begin teaching kids at an early level about nonviolent so we can live here without destroying personal property and how and what modern Luther King Jr. stood for. So I've raised money for the center, I have worked in voter registration drives, I have raised money for the NAACP, I'm always doing benefits for the NAACP speaking functions where you have a bandwidth and I will be many times I've addressed them. These are the kind of things that I've been involved in. I was involved in the pilgrimage of SCLC just recently to get the Voting Rights Act extended, which was probably one of the most successful efforts that we've seen in this decade thus far. What was it like growing up during the civil rights movement?

Did you understand what was going on? I'm quite sure your father had a lot of late night meetings of people coming and going. Did you realize your father was actually changing the course of history? At that particular time I really did because I was ten years old when he died of course. And I guess I would have been seven or eight, six when I realized what was going on. But I never really understood the impact of what he was doing at that time. It was not until I became, I guess, 15, 16 that I began to visually understand what type of impact he was having and the movement that he led and the other persons who were involved were making on this nation and eventually the world. It's about every major problem that we have in America can be categorized under one of those areas, read the nation of poverty and racism and violence. The strategies that you use to do this, I don't necessarily have.

I think non-violence is one attempt to begin to rectify some of the problems, especially when you're talking about violence. Non-violence is what we must learn and there are various steps toward achieving non-violence. There are about five or six steps we are conducting a training program. When I say we're not me but the center is conducting a training program with non-violent action steps that can be taken in the cities so that we can reduce some of the violence that occurs because that is the black on black crime we are consistently killing our own young people or killing each other, older people or killing each other and we must put an end to that before it puts an end to us. You mentioned earlier in the program about growing up under your father on the greatness that was surrounding you.

You probably one of the few fortunate black Americans who have surrounded themselves with heavy weights. Your great-grandfather was a leader in the church, your grandfather was a leader in church and also your father. What influence that that leadership have on your life thus far? Well being conditioned and when I say being conditioned and being around powerful people as well as my mother because she also had and has a tremendous influence on my life had and has as well as my grandfather. I think that what that did was only I guess you would say cement put the cement, I mean that was a foundation and the foundation was built with my mother and it was put in

cement with my grandfather and being surrounded by my father so that it makes me know that I cannot be what I ought to be into of a man or what they ought to be. I can't be what I ought to be into you or what you ought to be in vice versa and God instructs you to his universe so that we are interdependent upon one another, no one can subsist on his or her own. This I feel we must understand and we want to say we as people, whites must understand a clue, clen must understand, a more majority must understand, then all the other types of I guess you would say other radical or reactionary groups, radical and reactionary groups, America is an melting pot of all different cultures of people and the only way that we will prevail is if we unite it as one, united we stand divided we will fall. What did it mean to you your father winning the Nobel Peace Prize?

Receiving the Nobel Peace Prize I guess was a high honor naturally in 1964 I didn't know anything about that I mean it was a great day now I can look back on it and think about it and say it was tremendous however on other hand awards and things daddy was not really concerned about because if you do just love mercy and try to walk wobbly with God then those things will come to you but his concern was to try to help someone else not bring praise and recognition to himself and so I think that was tremendous and I put it in its perspective however the man which I think is greater is what he did with what he

got but what is greater still is that here's a man who was wealthy with spiritual gifts not financial and material gifts however he could have been wealthy from a material standpoint of view he could have been the college or university president just that he could have had anything could have been had a corporation he could have been maybe even ruler of a country of that's what he wanted he was offered many things they offered him money they offered him any job they offered him women and you know I say this jokingly but it was probably true they even offered him white women and he refused and denied all of those things and eventually they said well we're gonna have to remove this black man from this planet

because he is not in the flesh he is not falling to the temptations that the average man would fall to they spent twenty million thirty million dollars the FBI trying to discredit him more money than they'd ever spent on one single investigation in history of this nation this was J. Edgar Hoover well I say all that just to throw in some filler but the thing that I feel it was more important was that he took that fifty thousand dollars at that time 1963 which would probably be equivalent to a hundred and fifty thousand seventy thousand a day nineteen sixty four actually and he didn't keep one dime of the money I don't know too many people who would have that kind of commitment I mean he didn't keep a dime he gave it all to the organizations the organizations that later criticized him and OACP or Urban League a host of others as well as to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference

of which he was president but personally he didn't keep it I think that was the greatest thing about the Nobel Peace Prize not so much that he got the prize because the prize that's that's marvelous ceremony is it in perspective that's great but what you do with what you have taking that money and certainly he could have taken it made it work for him made investments we would be you know maybe doing very very well financially today when I say we I mean we may not have it may not have taken us fourteen years or thirteen years to build a king's center if he had taken some of the money that he made and invested but he was not about that and every dime that he made him I mean he put away a little bit I mean even when he died daddy had in the state of about three thousand dollars that's not really any money naturally he I mean maybe back then it was worth what five ten thousand dollars but that's not any real money when you're talking about leaving a family for kids

and you know to survive but he always had an unabided faith and he believed that regardless of what happens today we're going to make it somehow SCLC didn't have money to pay people every day even the day SCLC didn't have money but somehow they rode in on faith and they were doing what is what was right and they were able to survive. Stevie Wonder's efforts the last couple of years the March on Washington to make your father's birthday a national holiday how's that coming along? The birthday has been slowed down effort because of the Reagan administration and their policies toward primarily not just a black community I think anything that has anything to do with any kind of social programming unless there is a major thrust and when I say a major thrust what I mean is a major lobbying effort if the people would create a mandate

then the bill would be passed. Stevie has done a tremendous job and probably wanted to find his persons that I can think of in terms of creating a consciousness in this country. If other entertainers would take that type of stand then we would be able to get the birthday bill with no problem so we must and I call it precipitating a crisis because that's what was done in the 60s in Birmingham to create the atmosphere and the condition for a civil rights act of 1964. Do you think you would cheat it after you're filed with the satinated? Well, it depends on what capacity what do you mean when you say cheated of having the companionship of your father? If you could say I suffered however I benefited so much from sometimes we have to lose a loved one to gain something and we lost and immense amount and we gained so much daddy

probably was not known as well as he is prior to his death. Now today and it's interesting you know here's a man who 14, 15 years ago died and was killed and today he's still known so in a sense is he really dead? Physically the man is dead but his message will live on forever and ever I think as long as there's injustice as long as people are treated unfairly Martin Luther King Jr's message love freedom and justice for all mankind. Any future efforts for the Martin Luther King Jr's Center for nonviolent social change? We're going to be involved in a number of things matter fact next year in 83 that will be in August of 83 will be 23 years I'm sorry 20 years since the March on Washington in 63 where they were over 100,000 persons demonstrating actually it was over 200,000 250,000 I believe

demonstrating that's how also was a catalyst toward the Civil Rights Act of 60 which was signed of course in 64 by London and Johnson. In 63 we are calling on all people of goodwill we bring in to give a coalition of over 100 organizations maybe even closer to 500 organizations but we will try to bring more people than were there in 1963 after Lincoln Memorial in Washington monument in between that area in Washington we're calling I guess it a celebration but actually it's the commemoration of the March on Washington celebration in 83 I believe Dr. Lowry is the co-chairperson in 83 but there will be a host of organizations labor unions you name it they will be involved all of those persons we want to kind of bring together that coalition in 63 so that we can appeal

to the conscience of a nation focusing on jobs, peace and freedom which that may change a little bit but primarily jobs, peace and freedom and we will go to that site and Stevie Wonders also going to be involved to pull the entertainers in if you back in 63 you have Sammy Davis, Harry Belafonte who pulled together a lot of persons Harry Belafonte really pulled together most of the people Charlton, Heston, Marlon, Brando and just a host of other actresses and actors, Eartha Kitt, Rita Franklin you name it they were there well Stevie will be helping in 83 to bring those kind of people there we will have someone from labor we will have someone from the business community so that we can have a demonstration similar to the one the solidity the solidarity they march in New York City. What is the continued value of Evan either Baptist Church? I guess Ebenezer would be historic because of the ministers that have been there and people

will come from all over the world I guess to visit Ebenezer because of Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Sr. then my great-grandfather 80 Williams and they Ebenezer I guess was the unique church and not just Ebenezer there are probably many Ebenezer across the country but Ebenezer because it has always been involved in social issues traditionally Baptist churches and you have this fight in terms of the two conventions that used to exist the progressive national Baptist convention and the national Baptist convention Ebenezer was a member of the progressive convention of Baptist churches and the national Baptist which was headed by Reverend J. H. Jackson just recently of course there's a switch now just a few months back they had their convention in Miami and the new president is Reverend Dr. T.J. Jemisin

out of Baton Rouge Louisiana well now I say that because they are those ministers who believe that the only thing you're supposed to do is on Wednesday and those members who believe on Wednesday you have prayer prayer meeting and from Wednesday to Sunday you prepare for the sermon Sunday you preach and then you wait for Wednesday and that same flow of things every day every week well that has to change because churches have to be involved socially and throughout and consequently you will create a consciousness throughout the nation and it has to be the black church that provides that sensitivity for I think this nation historically black church has had provided that sensitivity so we have to understand that all of that is an integral part of life and for our development and if we do these things then in fact black people will survive white people will survive and this nation and the world will survive Marty King son of the late civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther

King Jr. if you have a comment or would like to purchase a cassette copy of this program write us the address is in black America longhorn radio network UT Austin 78712 for in black America's technical producer Walter Morgan I am John Hanson John is next week you've been listening to in black America discussions of the black experience in contemporary society in black America is produced and distributed by the Center for Telecommunication Services at UT Austin and does not necessarily reflect the views of this station or the University of Texas at Austin this is the longhorn radio network.