Founder’s Day
Join us in celebrating the rich history of The King Center on the anniversary of our founding by Mrs. Coretta Scott King every June 26.
Our History
The Martin Luther King Center for Nonviolent Social Change (The King Center) was established on June 26th, 1968, by the late Mrs. Coretta Scott King approximately two months after the assassination of her husband Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on April 4th of the same year.
Mrs. King founded The King Center to serve as both a living memorial to her late husband and a programmatic nonprofit. The King Center was established with the vision of creating the Beloved Community, where injustice ceases and love prevails, and is on a mission to empower people to create a just, humane, equitable, and peaceful world by applying Dr. King’s philosophy and methodology of Nonviolence (Nonviolence365). Mrs. Coretta Scott King envisioned The King Center to be “a living memorial filled with all the vitality that was his, a center of human endeavor, committed to the causes for which he lived and died.”
For 55 years, The King Center has strategically pursued the Beloved Community through a wide range of dynamic in-person and online educational opportunities, trainings, and community-serving programs. The King Center’s intentional utilization of Kingian Nonviolence has transformed communities and prioritized both reconciliation and redemption ultimately creating a dynamic, restorative, and equitable path forward for our world; void of racism, militarism, and poverty.
Beyond our many programs serving youth and adults worldwide, The King Center attracts more than a million visitors each year and hosts the largest repository of civil rights archives in our King Library and Archives. Guests can also visit Freedom Hall, The Yolanda D. King Theatre for the Performing Arts, and The King Center Bookstore and Resource Center. As a National Historic Site, The King Center campus is free and open to the public, where guests can freely view Dr. and Mrs. King’s Crypt, The Coretta Scott King Monument and The Coretta Scott King Peace and Meditation Garden, the Eternal Flame, and The King Center’s Reflecting Pool. The King Center aligns with our namesake in believing that “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere…Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”, and as a result, we welcome and affirm the social, economic, spiritual, physical, sexual, and gender diversities of our global audience.