Martin Luther King: Pilgrimage To The Mountaintop

In King: Pilgrimage to the Mountaintop, Harvard Sitkoff discussed the high and low points of the prominent leader Martin Luther King Jr. who fought for the civil rights movement. The author shares with us each step that Martin Luther took in order to gain success. This biography focuses on the success and failures that Martin Luther King faced since birth till his assassination. It also focuses on the struggles that he faced to fight for freedom and civil rights, not just for blacks but for everyone.
Martin Luther King Jr., who was originally named Michael King or “Little Mike”, was born on January 15, 1929 in Georgia to Alberta Williams King and Michael King. 1 Coming from a family of preachers, King’s family expected him to become a preacher as well. Since the early days of Martin Luther’s life, his family implanted the religious beliefs in him and taught him to oppose segregation. After attending many public schools and skipping 9th grade, King passed the entrance exam for Morehouse
College, where he initially wanted to become a lawyer or a doctor instead of following his father’s footsteps. Although he got distracted from his religious beliefs during the years he attended Morehouse College, he decided to enter the ministry at the age of eighteen during his senior year. 2 Later in that summer, King joined Crozer Theological Seminary to begin his biblical studies where he used the word of God to fulfill his own “inescapable urge to serve society.” 3
After graduating from Crozer, he joined Boston University to begin his doctoral program in the fall of 1951. At Boston University, King was able to expand public speaking skills which
1 King: Pilgrimage to the mountain top, 1
2 Ibid, 12
3 Ibid, 13 inspired the public. While studying in Boston, Martin fell in love with Coretta Scott and got married to her on June 18, 1953. After finishing his studies, Dexter offered its pastorship to king at a salary of $4,200 per year, which made him the “highest paid Negro minister in Montgomery.” 4
Later in Dexter, following Rosa Parks’ refusal to give up her seat on the bus, Dr. King was chosen as the Montgomery Improvement Association president to head the boycott. Sitkoff reveals that Dr. King has also faced discrimination in his early days. For example, he was asked to give up his seat on a bus and forced to leave a diner at gunpoint in New Jersey. 5 The teaching that his family instilled in him, which was to “hate segregation but love those who practiced it” 6 helped him lead the boycott and gain desegregation successfully. After a long period of 382-day boycott, Whites and Blacks were able to travel on the same bus next to each other because of King’s strategies and ability to inspire non-violent protests. 7
King’s endless travel and public speaking helped him gain more opportunity to be in power and prove his leadership skills. Sitkoff expounds that Martin Luther fought for desegregation and equality throughout his life time. Movements that lead to his success included, the bus trips through South to protest, project confrontation with the Southern Christian Leaders Committee, Alabama march, and so on. During his life time he has also written many inspiring words through the Letter from Birmingham Jail, I have a dream speech, and his books. 8 Dr.
4 Harvard Stikoff, King 20
5 Ibid, 10
6Ibid, 10
7Ibid, 53
8Ibid
King’s non-violent acts also called for the civil rights act and “national backing for substantial civil rights legislation”. 9
Harvard Sitkoff ended this book by giving details of Martin Luther’s assassination.
“The bullet – shot out of a high-velocity rifle from the rooming house opposite the motel – smashed through King’s neck, exploded his right cheek and jaw, and severed his spinal cord.”10 Sitkoff’s last words convinces us that a shot that was aimed by many but, fired by one only took away his life, but kept his words alive in us.
In King: The Pilgrimage to the Mountaintop, Harvard Sitkoff presents a relevant and radical king. Martin Luther’s life events such as, fight for desegregation, Alabama march, project confrontation, and freedom rides, serves as an evidence of him being a prominent leader and a radical king which also supports Sitkoff’s thesis. The primary source that sitkoff used to support his thesis were the letters and books by Martin Luther. Moreover, he also used secondary sources such as, Clayborne Carson, David J. Garrow, Taylor Branch, the King center in Atlanta and many
others.
Harvard Sitkoff has done an outstanding job with structuring the book. Sitkoff organized the chapters chronologically and thematically giving them a specific title that connects with what he discussed in each chapter. For example, he followed King’s life from birth till his assassination. However, Sitkoff did not use the help of any pictures to portray the life events of Martin Luther King. Instead, he sought help from the works of other expertise to support his statements. In my opinion, if the author used imagery to describe Dr. King’s life events, it
9 King: Pilgrimage to the mountain top, 115
10 Ibid, 234 would’ve gave the reader a better understanding of the events.
Sitkoff also gives us an equitable view of Martin Luther King Jr.’s life by providing us with his failures and successes. For example, one of the low points discussed in this book is how he started plagiarizing at Crozier and Morehouse. Harvard Sitkoff also stated that King had a hard time adjusting to his religious beliefs and following his father’s footsteps. However, by the end of the book, Martin Luther’s successes outweighed his failures.
In conclusion, the organization of Sitkoff’s writing helped the readers follow through Dr. King’s life from the beginning to the end. As Raleigh states, his persuasive style, including organization and other choices of material raised the biography to the top rank of books about King. Through the evidences that Harvard Sitkoff provided, it proves that “the more militant king is the more relevant king.”