Martin Luther King Jr.
Greensboro, Guilford County, North Carolina
Marker Inscription
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., / planned to speak at / Trinity AME Zion Chruch / in Greensboro (a few blocks / from here) on april 4, 1968. He / canceled his visit to Greensboro / to remain in Memphis where he / was assassinated on that day.
The Story
By the spring of 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was crisscrossing the country in support of striking sanitation workers and his broader Poor People's Campaign, and Greensboro—already a landmark of the movement after its 1960 lunch-counter sit-ins—was on his itinerary. He was scheduled to preach at Trinity AME Zion Church just blocks from this spot on April 4, 1968, but stayed in Memphis to stand with the sanitation strikers. That evening he was assassinated on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel, and the Greensboro sermon was never delivered.
Why it matters
The marker fixes a quiet local footnote to one of the darkest days in American history, reminding us how closely the civil rights struggle touched ordinary communities and how much was lost in an instant.
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Related people
- · Martin Luther King Jr.
Related events
- · Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.
- · Poor People's Campaign
- · Memphis sanitation strike
Themes & tags
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