ROMANS WILL HONOR CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER MARTIN LUTHER KING JR ALL THIS WEEKEND

The local four-day celebration to honor slain Civil Rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. kicks off tonight. The 2020 MLK Weekend Celebration will be hosted by the MLK Commission of Rome and Northwest Georgia. It will culminate with the annual Freedom March down Broad Street on this coming Monday, MLK Day.

Alvin Jackson, an active member of the MLK Commission of Rome/NWGA, says that he often considers the legacy of Dr. King and the non-violent stance through which he promoted unity.

Rome’s MLK Weekend Celebration, the largest in Georgia, will begin tonight with the “Back Down Memory Lane” Birthday Extravaganza. The show will start at 6:30 pm at the Rome 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.

MLK Day has been observed as a federal holiday in the US since 1986. The local MLK Weekend Celebration began that very same year.