When MLK was assassinated

In 1968, my younger sister and I travelled to Florida and the Bahamas with my mom and her parents. We were on our way home, passing through Savannah, Georgia, when Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Mom said the locals were happy about it, and we didn't see any flags at half-staff until we got to Indiana. Coincidentally, we had toured Lookout Mountain on the way south, and Lookout Mountain is mentioned in MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech. I was reminded of it Monday when my son and I attended an MLK ceremony at Concordia College in St. Paul.

Another thing I was reminded of was a two-page magazine spread Mom had posted at the top of our kitchen bulletin board for much of our childhood, showing a black baby and a white baby, and the lyrics to the song, "We Shall Overcome." Mom and I don't always see eye-to-eye on issues of race, but that had an impact on me.