October 14, 1964 - King Awarded Peace prize

Human Rights a Day

Dr. Martin Luther King awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. A dedicated activist who worked to end discrimination against African Americans, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King became the symbolic leader of the American civil rights movement. Between 1957 and his assassination in 1968, King traveled millions of miles to speak thousands of times to hundreds of thousands of people. His quest was for equality among all men and women. In 1963, 250,000 predominantly African Americans marched on Washington, D.C., then paused to hear King deliver his “I have a dream” speech. Besides his public speaking, King wrote five books and met several times with Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. He was selected as one of the ten most outstanding personalities of the year by Time magazine, which named him Man of the Year in 1963. But a highlight of his career occurred on October 14, 1964, when King, who’d been jailed numerous times for his convictions, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. At age 35, he was the youngest man, second American and third black man to be awarded this honour. King turned the $54,123 in prize money over to the civil rights movement. Only four years later, on April 4, 1968, King was assassinated while standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.