By Etha Gray
On Monday, April 4 of each year, I hope that we will each take a moment to pause in reflection and remember that on this date, America lost one of the greatest heroes that it has ever had. I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. King in 1965, on the day of my ‘Hooding’ ceremony at Erma Hughes Business College in Houston. I was granted the honor of interviewing him. That is one of the proudest moments of my life, for it changed me from the inside out. Therefore, in commemoration of that event, I have taken the following excerpt from my book, Journey Into Freedom, with the permission of Concepts ‘N’ Publishing:“Then, it was time to leave the motel to go to the Masonic Temple for the meeting. Dr. King hesitated a moment and told his aides, “If you will excuse me, I’d like to call my wife before I leave.” He told her, “Corrie? Corrie, I just wanted to call and let you know that I’m all right. I don’t remember if I told you how much I love you, before I left home, but I do love you, dear. So very, very much. The children, are they all right? Give them my love and try to make them understand how much I love them, and how important my work really is…” He was interrupted by one of his aides, “Excuse me, Dr. King. It’s time to go. They’re here for us.” He acknowledged the interruption and completed his conversation with his wife. “Corrie, I must go now, dear. But please remember, you are so very important to me, my life, my work. I love you, I really do. Good-bye dear.” Slowly, he hung up the phone. It was as though he did not want the connection to be broken.As they left the room, they paused on the veranda, and he looked out at the people surrounding him. A distinct voice called out from the crowd below, “Hey, Dr. King. I’m gonna be with you tonight. We gon’ have us a good time.”Recognizing the voice, he leaned over the veranda and replied, “Yeah, I’ll be looking for you. I want you to play my song for me tonight. You know the one, Precious Lord, take my …’ Ka-powww--ww-w-w-. The shot echoed over the city and around the world. It echoes still, in the ethers.So it was that on the fourth day of April, in the year nineteen hundred and sixty-eight, as he leaned over the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, asking one of his friends to “…play my song for me tonight. You know the one, Precious Lord, take my …” the Supreme God kept his promise.“And your removal will be such that it will send a wave of shock through the very essence of the total being of all residing upon the face of the earth.” The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. was felled by an assassin’s bullet.And as has been declared by all the prophets in all the lands, “God does not permit His messengers to suffer beyond reason.” Dr. King did not suffer. It was estimated by doctors that it is doubtful he knew what hit him. As History has witnessed, an assassin’s bullet meant to be an end, was really a new beginning.The world stood in shock at the news that an assassin’s bullet had cut down one of the greatest leaders ever to reside in this nation, America. The news was carried by every conceivable means known to mankind. The entire nation shut down for five days, mourning and honoring God’s chosen prophet in death. Men and women from the highest offices of the four corners of the world, totaling more than two hundred and fifty thousand of every race, creed, denomination and color became a rainbowed sea of humanity as they walked side by side behind a simple casket drawn by two Georgia mules - the symbol of abject humility - hand in hand, arm in arm, to Morehouse College to attend his open air service. Millions upon millions of grown men and women mourned and cried shamelessly in the streets, in their homes and any place where there was a television screen or radio, intoning the proceedings of the funeral. And it was that grief, that helpless feeling, which engraved upon their hearts to ‘Keep the Dream Alive.’As the world watched and mourned his death, Martin’s helpmate, ‘strong in mind and spirit,’ shielded her sorrow and stood gracefully proud that her husband’s life struggles, and yes, even his death, had accomplished what no other American had done in this nations’ history. The strength, pride and courage exhibited by her on that day became the example by which other women would bear their sorrows, in the future.And the ethers rejoiced as the world watched her, with head held high, lead the subdued crowd of sad-faced mourners to her husband’s final resting place.”Let us remember to keep this date of the end of his life as sacred as we have the beginning. For truly it is sacred.