15 Facts About Martin Luther King Jr.
- His birth name was actually Michael King Jr. His father was named Michael King and changed his first name to Martin Luther when he became a minister. The younger Michael changed his name to Martin as well, initially against his father's wishes.
- At 12 years old, distraught over his grandmother's death, King attempted to commit suicide by jumping out of a second-story window.
- He entered Moorehouse College at the age of only 15, thanks to a special wartime program intended to boost enrollment by admitting promising high school students. He graduated with a bachelor's degree at the age of 19.
- At first, he didn't want to become a preacher, preferring instead to be a doctor or lawyer.
- Because no honeymoon suites were available for African-Americans, King and his wife Coretta spent their wedding night at a friend's funeral parlor.
- In 1958, while at a book signing, he was stabbed by a mentally ill woman. The knife was so close to his aorta that if he had so much as sneezed he would have most likely have died. King didn't press any charges against the woman.
- He was a Trekkie. OK, he probably didn't own any Spock ears, but he was enough of a fan of the original "Star Trek" show to persuade actress Nichelle Nichols (who played Uhura) to stay on when she thought of leaving after the first season.
- Internet rumors to the contrary, there was never any evidence that King had any ties to any Communist organizations despite constant surveillance by the FBI.
- The final section of his famous "I Have a Dream" speech is believed to have been largely improvised.
- He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 at age 35, and remains youngest male to ever receive the prize. (Mairead Corrigan, co-founder of the Northern Ireland Peace Movement, is the youngest female.)
- King's autopsy revealed that though he was only 39 when he died, he had the heart of a 60-year-old man, assumedly stress-related.
- King was not the only member of his family to be assassinated. His mother, Alberta Williams King, was shot and killed in 1974 in her Atlanta church.
- He is the only U.S. citizen who never held political office to have a national holiday named after him.
- Although the federal holiday was enacted in 1983, all 50 states did not officially observe Martin Luther King Jr. Day until 2000.
- Martin Luther King Jr. Day also is celebrated in Toronto, Canada, and Hiroshima, Japan.
