Board approves naming Memphis street for MLK

AP ^ | 01/12/2012 | ADRIAN SAINZ

[Responsibility2nd]

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Memphis officials on Thursday approved naming a city street after the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., nearly 44 years after the civil rights leader was killed in the city.

The 10 members of the Memphis and Shelby County Land Use Control Board voted unanimously to re-name a nine-block downtown stretch as Dr. Martin Luther King Avenue. Previously called Linden Avenue, it runs in front of the FedExForum, where the Memphis Grizzlies play their home games, and parallel to Beale Street, the famous tourist drag.

The street also runs near the Clayborn Temple, where King rallied with striking sanitation workers days before he was assassinated by James Earl Ray on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel on April 4, 1968. King also led a march on Linden Avenue during the strike.

The city already had a section of Interstate 240 dedicated to King, but the naming of a prominent street in the city's tourist district is being seen as a symbol that the city is finally taking steps to heal the wound caused by the assassination

[troy McClure]

They should just call it Murder & Mayhem Blvd.

[Revolting cat!]

What, no Malcolm the Tenth Way?

[Publius6961]

This is actually a very useful Public service. Not so much for locals as the unwary and the tourist. This is true for half a mile on both sides of the street. Keep your doors locked and be prepared to run red lights when your life is threatened.

At night, get off that street as if your life depended on it. It does.