Jeremy Ryan

Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images By Lerone Martin and Jonathan Eig From The New York Times For years, we’ve been trying, with some frustration, to identify the white boy who introduced Martin Luther King Jr. to racism. Dr. King told the story himself, first in a college essay, and then again in interviews, until it formed the core of his origin story. It went like this: He was 3 years old and still known as Mike, the name on his birth certificate, when he made friends with a white boy whose...

From Literary Hub At some point during Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1944 train trip from Atlanta to Simsbury, Conn., the hungry, rambunctious teenager left the company of his fellow Morehouse students and went to the state-of-the-art dining car to enjoy Southern Railway’s fine dining on wheels. He had no idea what was awaiting him. The tagline of the Southern Railway Company was “Southern serves the South.” The company motto referred to more than just geography, but also the “Southern way of...

From BookPage This revealing, vividly told biography illuminates a fact worth remembering: Our greatest leaders do not emerge fully formed in the moment in which they are most needed, but are molded by family, community and education. Martin’s captivating Young King shows how these influences and experiences “coalesced to produce a man, a minister, and a dreamer who changed the world.” Read more ...