Coretta Scott King 1927 – 2006
Coretta Scott King was an American author, activist, civil rights leader, and the wife of Martin Luther King Jr. She met her husband while attending graduate school in Boston. They were both active in the American civil rights movement and Coretta King was active in the Women’s Movement.
Two months after her husband’s assassination in 1968 she founded The Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, Inc. and took on the leadership of the struggle for racial equality. She also succeeded in making his birthday a national holiday, getting Ronald Reagan to sign legislation which established Martin Luther King, Jr., Day in 1983. She later broadened her scope to include both advocacy for LGBTQ rights and opposition to apartheid.
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