Posted on 04/04/2018 3:57:31 AM PDT by Nextrush
"I have come to think of my role as one which operates outside the realm of partisan politics raising the issues and through action create the situation which forces whatever party is in power to act creatively and constuctively in response to the dramatic presentations of these issues on the public scene..."
Dr. Martin Luther King expresses no interest in being a 1968 presidential candidate-April 25, 1967
I had watched the evening news on NBC ("The Huntley-Brinkley Report") and was aware that this person Martin Luther King was in Memphis getting himself involved in a garbage workers strike.
His dramatic April 3rd speech may have been part of the story I was watching, a speech that seemed to point to his death.
In the last presidential election year 1964 Dr. King had received an audio sex tape from the FBI obviously a message from the Democrats. JFK's widow called King a "despicable man" and he was considered an enemy of the Kennedy's and the Democrat Party.
In recent days, the anti-Vietnam War movement that he was a part of had helped to bring down the incumbent Democrat President Lyndon Johnson. Johnson had decided to drop out of the Democrat contest for President of the United States.
MLK probably sensed some sort of of "payback" was coming but I won't indulge in conspiracy theories about his death.
There was a lot more that I didn't understand being only seven years old 50 years ago today Thursday April 4, 1968.
Television was the cutting edge of media back then dominated by over the air signals sometimes enhanced and spread hundreds of miles by translators and cable television.
Three major television networks were the dominant forces of the medium (NBC, CBS and ABC).
They were entertainment oriented enterprises with news filling small segments, sometimes extended by major events, but only during 1963's JFK Assassination has there been round the clock TV news.
Color was new in 1968. In my home there was a color set but I watched most of my television on a monochrome (black and white set) in my bedroom.
NBC's local VHF station was the most powerful signal but I watched a lot of ABC programs on a UHF channel. ABC aimed on younger audiences and on Thursday night the "Batman" series was big viewing for me.
As I recall this Thursday it was just after 8pm Eastern when NBC interrupted the "Daniel Boone" series I happened to be watching.
The "NBC News Special Report" slide was accompanied by announcer saying that Dr. Martin Luther King had been shot and killed in Memphis.
King was shot just after 6pm in Memphis, 7pm in the East where I lived and there had been earlier interruptions to announce the shooting before his death on the various networks.
Television needed time to warm up studio cameras in 1968 and breaking news often was broadcast audio only with a slide on the screen.
The adults did not want to talk about the matter when I walked out of the bedroom. They were fearful of the violence that was about to erupt, the worst racial violence of the 1960's
The linke below is of the CBS News coverage just after 9pm Eastern.
First part is the nationwide "Special Report" with Dan Rather in New York bringing in a live feed from Memphis.
Then the 930pm Eastern special re-edited 'CBS Evening News' for 630pm broadcast on the West Coast from Washington with Walter Cronkite,
Cronkite was in DC to leave with President Johnson that night while Rather, the White House correspondent, was in New York having covered Johnson's activities earlier in the day.
Link below......
I remember that day. I had just turned 9 the day before.
....I was just finishing up basic training
I remember it well. I was just shy of 17. Lived about an hour’s drive from Memphis. For the most part Memphis was closed for business.
Damn it, he didn’t earn a doctorate. He engaged is massive a ademuc fraud. Stop referring to him as “Doctor”, HE DID NOT EARN A DOCTORATE!!!
That’s what I get for typing angry...
Back in the early 1990s (when I was a university student), I read an article (or perhaps it was a documentary)that discussed about how both MLK and RFK were planning a large demonstration like the 1963 Million Man March that was going to be for getting the United States out of Vietnam and also for black rights. Apparently many establishment Dems like LBJ and others and their friends in the FBI saw this planned demonstration as a threat and acting on this threat was a likely theory as to why both men were shot dead within the space of two months.
He also only cheated on his wife with white women.
Apparently he was awarded a doctorate, and Boston U. decided not to take it away from him in spite of plagiarism.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King_Jr._authorship_issues
Well, he did earn a PhD. The PC police won’t take it away. The committee that investigated it said the dissertation still made substantial acedemic contribution. I do have, however, zero doubts they would have taken away mine.
His name was Michael King.
He was not an actual minister.
He liked to beat white prostitutes as part of the sex act.
That’s why the tapes have not been released, is my opinion.
Now that he’s dead 50 years, isn’t it time to release his FBI file?
And his legal name is Michael....
I was in the last few weeks of “A” School at the NTC San Diego. His shooting didn’t affect me one way or another. I was more concerned about what my next duty station would be. Later on a few shipmates and I attended a rally for George Wallace and Curtis LeMay. I think I still have the Wallace/LeMay license plate that I bought for a dollar at the event. General LeMay was an advocate of using nukes on enemies in situations where lots of our men would likely die if the choice was ground warfare. Wonder what nuking Hanoi might have resulted in besides a lot of dead gooks?
Michael row the boat ashore.
Grease man had some things to say about Mike King.
King David had his glaring flaws too yet God used him. MLK was no angel but his message of non-violence and character taking precedence over skin color were instructional themes to live by. My beef is with those who celebrate him but don’t live by the themes he preached.
Boston University disagrees with you.
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