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Written by Kathy Voytko   
Wednesday, 18 January 2012 18:46
Martin Luther King, Jr. is recognized as the symbol of the civil rights movement in America.   His work for nonviolent social change began in Montgomery, Alabama where he was the pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church.  Rosa Parks refused to obey the city policy of segregation on buses in 1955 and King, known for his personal courage and public speaking skills, was elected to the Montgomery Improvement Association.  The beginnings of the nonviolent civil rights movement began.
Years later, as the nation moved toward equality, King was in Memphis, Tennessee to organize a nonviolent march in support of local sanitation workers. On April 4, 1968 King was standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel when his life’s work was cut short by an assassin’s bullet.  
On April 8, 1968, just four days later, Coretta Scott-King the wife of the slain civil rights leader, flew to Memphis to lead the march that her husband had begun.  She spoke to the crowd stating, “Those of you who believe in what Martin Luther King, Jr. stood for, I would challenge you today to see that his spirit never dies. We are going to continue his work to make all people truly free and to make every person feel that he is a human being.”
Coretta Scott was born on April 27, 1927 to much simpler means than her husband Martin Luther King, who grew up in a middle-class black family in Atlanta.  Her father and mother lived on a farm outside of Marion, Alabama.  They had four children whom they raised on the farm that had been owned by the family since the Civil War, a rare thing for blacks in those days.  The family was far from rich, and experienced very difficult times during the Depression.  Coretta learned to hoe and pick cotton along with other farm work to help the family.  Her father was the first black man in the community to own a truck that he used to haul lumber, which brought him into competition with the white men of the area.  Later he opened a country store.  Coretta often wondered what her father could have accomplished had he been given the opportunity to move beyond a sixth-grade education.
Bernice Scott only had a fourth-grade education, but was adamant that her daughters would have a college degree.  Coretta and her siblings would walk five miles to a black one-room school where six grades were taught. She learned early about discrimination, as the white children would pass them on their bus to the school in Marion.  She met her first college-educated teachers when she attended the private missionary Lincoln High School with both black and white students.  Due to the distance from her home, Coretta would stay at the school from Monday until Friday.  Her mother found this unacceptable and found a bus that she could drive daily for the students from their home ten miles away.  This was an unheard of thing for a woman to do in those days.  Coretta learned early to have calm determination when managing a problem.
In 1945, Coretta enrolled at Antioch College in nearby Yellow Springs, Ohio.  She was somewhat apprehensive about attending a northern school where white students were better prepared for higher education, however she quickly adapted.  She elected to pursue her degree in elementary education and participated in the work-study program, where she was involved in the nursery school program, as a camp counselor, and as a library assistant.  Scott did not encounter racial prejudice at Antioch until it was time for her student teaching.  
Yellow Springs public schools had no black teachers at the time, although the classes were integrated.  She was asked to travel nine miles away to Xenia or remain at the Antioch Demonstration School.  Scott took her concerns to the college president, but found little support and completed her program at the Antioch School.   Her lifelong interest in music was growing at Antioch.  She was a member of the choir at the Second Baptist Church in Springfield and performed in concerts in Pennsylvania and Alabama and considered pursuing musical education following graduation from Antioch.  
Coretta graduated from Antioch in June of 1951.  She moved to Boston where she enrolled in The New England Conservatory of Music with full tuition and an intention to become a professional singer.  She was living in the home of a wealthy Massachusetts family and working for her room and board.  A friend introduced her to a young minister from Atlanta who was pursuing a doctorate in theology at Boston University.  Because of their similar backgrounds in having fathers who were willing to stand up for justice for blacks in the South, Coretta Scott and Martin Luther King, Jr. found they had much in common.  They were married at Coretta’s childhood home on June 18, 1953.
Coretta Scott-King spent a little less than fifteen years as the wife and partner of Martin Luther King, Jr.  She gave birth to her first child just two weeks before the Rosa Parks boycott in 1955. Coretta balanced raising four children and completing a great deal of the administrative work for the civil rights movement.  She handled the mail and phone calls from their home office while dealing with the increasing number of threats on his life with grace and calm.  She endured the bombing of her home in Montgomery.  There was harassment, jailing, more bombings and threats that terrified the family.  At some point, Coretta decided to overcome the fear rather than turn her back on their life’s work.
When Martin Luther King, Jr. died in 1968, Coretta Scott-King made a commitment to continue his work.  She calmed the anger of King followers and encouraged their recommitment to the nonviolent ways of her husband.  She walked in his place at marches, gave speeches at events for civil rights and anti-Vietnam War events.  In 1969 she planned for the creation of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change which now stands in Atlanta, his hometown.  
Coretta Scott-King envisioned her future as a concert performer.  Her life’s work changed when she married Martin Luther King, Jr.  She passed away on January 30, 2006 after a lifetime of work for equal rights, equal opportunity and social justice for all people not only here in the United States, but around the world.  As we remember Martin Luther King’s birthday this month, we remember the legacy of his work that was continued by his wife and partner, Coretta Scott King.
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Last Updated on Sunday, 22 January 2012 00:48