Remembering MLK’s Legacy

I stood footsteps away from the balcony where Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed. I stared at the striking photo in my guidebook, titled “Assassination – April 4, 1968,” and looked out onto the balcony of room 307 at the Lorraine Motel. That’s where he lay; that’s where a man covered his wound with a cloth while those that surrounded his body pointed to where the shot came from. After touring the National Civil Rights Museum—engulfed by the spirit, the growth of one of the most explosive movements in America—the weight of this tragedy struck me. This was the place where America’s great dreamer was killed. A man who led by non-violent means, yet whose life was taken in the most violent way.

When I arrived at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee, my eye first went directly to the original Lorraine Motel sign. The marquee read, “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.” —Martin Luther King, Jr. An organization called the Lorraine Foundation worked toward converting this almost torn down motel into a museum of history, struggle, and most importantly, remembrance of America’s Civil Rights Movement. After years of planning and renovation, the Lorraine Motel was eventually converted into the National Civil Rights Museum in August 1991. One part hotel and one part museum, I knew I was in for a unique experience.

And a unique experience it was! Each exhibit was designed by means of interactive multimedia highlighting events from 1954 to 1968. The museum covered it all—the sights, sounds, voices, images, and emotion of every element of the civil rights movement. The timeline begins with 1600s, to the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the freedom riders, and the March on Washington, up until present-day human rights movements. Visitors can walk onto an actual bus and sit next to a statue of the weary Rosa Parks while listening to a recording of the angry driver shouting. There is also a replica of a lunch counter sit-in where protester statues sit in name of equal rights for everyone. Guests can walk into a jail cell, exactly like the one Martin Luther King was imprisoned in when he wrote Letter from a Birmingham Jail, and get a sense of what it must have been like.