LOCAL MLK WEEKEND CELEBRATION TO CULMINATE WITH THE ANNUAL FREEDOM MARCH

Today is MLK Day. The third Monday in January has been a federal holiday to honor slain Civil Rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. since 1986.

The local four-day MLK Weekend Celebration will culminate today with the annual Freedom March down Broad Street. Participants are asked to meet at the corner of Broad Street and First Avenue at 11 am. The Freedom March is slated to begin at 11:30 am. It will head down Broad Street to the Rome City Auditorium for a special program at noon, for which Meredith Lilly, Director of External Affairs for DeKalb County, will deliver the keynote address. This program will be followed by a free lunch at the Rome Civic Center.

Alvin Jackson, spokesman for the MLK Commission of Rome and Northwest Georgia, indicates that locals’ participation in the Freedom March is one way to demonstrate that Dr. King’s dream is still alive.

The MLK Jr. Community Choir will also perform during the noon celebration at the City Auditorium.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was born on January 15, 1929 in Atlanta. He was assassinated on April 4, 1968 at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, TN, now the site of the National Civil Rights Museum.