Coretta Scott King
Coretta Scott King (born April 27, 1927 in Marion , Alabama , † January 30, 2006 in Rosarito , Mexico ) was an American civil rights activist and the wife of Martin Luther King .
Life
Scott grew up on their parents Obadiah and Bernice McMurry Scott's farm in Alabama. Even as a little girl she had to help pick the cotton because of the economic hardship . The United States was ruled by the Great Depression in the 1930s ; the country only slowly recovered from the Great Depression (beginning in 1929). In 1945 she graduated from the Lincoln Normal School in Marion as top of the class . At Antioch College in Yellow Springs ( Ohio ), she studied music. In addition to singing, she devoted herself to the violin and the piano. After that she moved to Boston ( Massachusetts ). On June 18, 1953, Coretta Scott married the Baptist pastor Martin Luther King, whom she had met while studying. The wedding took place at Scott's childhood home in Marion; King's father trusted them both.
Scott supported her husband in his work. She took part in protest marches and also represented him at speeches. She also gave concerts for civil rights. On January 30, 1956, she and her eldest daughter narrowly escaped death when the family home was bombed (Martin Luther King was out at the same time to deliver a speech). Four days after Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968 , she led a demonstration of 35,000 people in the city.
She worked all her life to preserve the memory of her murdered husband. She wrote two books about her time with King and the civil rights movement . In 1999, she and her family won a lawsuit proving that King's killer was not a lone perpetrator, but that King's murder was a plot .
In the 1980s in particular, one focus of her political activity was the fight against apartheid . She took part in several sit-ins in Washington, DC and traveled to South Africa in 1986 , where she met Winnie Mandela . Nelson Mandela had been a political prisoner since 1964 and was imprisoned on Robben Island . After her return she urged Ronald Reagan (1981-1989 US President ) to impose sanctions on South Africa.
She has received honorary degrees from several institutions, including Princeton University and Bates College . She was a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha , a renowned African American sorority.
On August 16, 2005, Scott King suffered a stroke , from which she was slow to recover, and a minor heart attack . On the evening of January 30, 2006, she died while sleeping in a rehabilitation center in Rosarito Beach, Mexico. She was buried at her husband's side at the King Center in Atlanta. King and Scott left four children:
- Yolanda King (born November 17, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama - † May 15, 2007 in Santa Monica, California)
- Martin Luther King III (born October 23, 1957 in Montgomery, Alabama)
- Dexter Scott King (born January 30, 1961 in Atlanta, Georgia)
- Bernice Albertine King (born March 28, 1963 in Atlanta, Georgia)
Awards
- 1969: Antonio Feltrinelli Prize
- since 1970 the Coretta Scott King Award of the American Library Association for Afro-American writers and illustrators
- 1983: Four Freedoms Award , in the religious freedom category
- 2004: Gandhi Peace Prize from the Government of India
- 2004: Gold Medal of Honor of the Congress
- Honorary doctorate and a. Princeton University , Duke University , Bates College
literature
- Coretta Scott King: My life with Martin Luther King. Mohn, Gütersloh 1985, ISBN 3-579-03643-2 .
- Laura T. McCarty: Coretta Scott King. A biography. Greenwood Press, Westport CT et al. 2009, ISBN 978-0-313-34981-2 .
- Vivian Octavian: Coretta. The story of Coretta Scott King . Quell-Verlag, Stuttgart 1971, ISBN 3-7918-1018-9 .
- Lisa Renee Rhodes: Coretta Scott King. Civil Rights Activist. Chelsea House Publishers, Philadelphia PA 2005, ISBN 0-7910-8251-2 ( Black Americans of Achievement ).
Web links
- Literature by and about Coretta Scott King in the catalog of the German National Library
- "The Widow's Legacy" , by Christoph von Marschall, Der Tagesspiegel online, February 2, 2006
- "Coretta Scott King, a Civil Rights Icon, Dies at 78" , by Peter Appelbome The New York Times online, February 1, 2006 with picture gallery and slide series
- "Four presidents honor King," Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, February 7, 2006 ( September 29, 2007 memento on the Internet Archive )
- Funeral Image Gallery , USA Today , February 7, 2006
- “The conspiracy against Martin Luther King” , by Peter De Thier, Berliner Zeitung online, December 10, 1999
- "The family of Martin Luther King wants to reopen the murder case of 1968" , Die Zeit online, 1997, no. 16
Individual evidence
- ↑ Roosevelt Institute, List of Prize Winners ( Memento of the original from March 25, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved December 14, 2012
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | King, Coretta Scott |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American civil rights activist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | April 27, 1927 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Marion , Alabama, United States |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 30, 2006 |
| Place of death | Rosarito , Mexico |