Martin Luther King Jr. was born in 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia to Reverend Michael King Sr. and Alberta Williams King. He attended Morehouse College and Crozer Theological Seminary, becoming a Baptist minister in 1954. In 1955, Rosa Parks' arrest sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott led by King, thrusting him into the civil rights movement. King advocated for nonviolent protest and gave his iconic "I Have a Dream" speech at the 1963 March on Washington. On April 4, 1968, King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee while supporting a sanitation workers' strike. He left a lasting legacy as one of the most influential leaders of the American civil rights movement.