THE ASSASSINATION OF DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING 50 YEARS AGO TODAY

"I have come to think of my role as one which operates outside the realm of partisan politics raising the issues and through action create the situation which forces whatever party is in power to act creatively and constructively in response to the dramatic presentations of these issues on the public scene...."

Dr. Martin Luther King expresses no interest in being a 1968 presidential candidate-April 25,  1967

I had watched the evening news on NBC ("The Huntley-Brinkley Report") and was aware that this person Martin Luther King was in Memphis getting himself involved in a garbage workers strike.

His dramatic April 3rd speech may have been part of the story I was watching., a speech that seemed to point to his death.

In the last presidential election year 1964 Dr. King had received an audio sex tape from the FBI obviously a message from the Democrats.   JFK's widow called King a "despicable man" and he was considered an enemy of the Kennedy's and the Democrat Party.

In recent days, the anti-Vietnam War movement that he was a part of had helped to bring down the incumbent Democrat President Lyndon Johnson.  Johnson had decided to drop out of the Democrat contest for President of the United States.

MLK probably sensed some sort of "payback" was coming but I won't indulge in conspiracy theories about his death.

There was a lot more that I didn't understand being only seven years old 50 years ago today Thursday April 4, 1968.

Television was the cutting edge of media back then dominated by over the air signals sometimes enhanced and spread hundreds of miles by translators and cable television.

Three major television networks were the dominant forces of the medium (NBC, CBS and ABC).

They were entertainment oriented enterprises with news filling small segments, sometimes extended by major events, but only during 1963's JFK Assassination had there been round the clock TV news.

Color was new in 1968.  In my home there was a color set but I watched most of my television on a monochrome (black and white set) in my bedroom.

NBC's local VHF station was the most powerful signal but I watched a lot of ABC programs on a UHF channel.  ABC aimed for younger audiences and on Thursday night's the "Batman" series was big viewing for me.

A I recall this Thursday it was just after 8pm Eastern when NBC interrupted the "Daniel Boone" series that I happened to be watching.

The "NBC News Special Report" slide was accompanied by an announcer saying that Dr. Martin Luther King had been shot and killed in Memphis.

King was shot just after 6pm in Memphis, 7pm in the East where I lived and there had been earlier interruptions to announce the shooting before his death on the various networks.

Television needed time to warm up studio cameras in 1968 and breaking news often was broadcast audio only with a slide on the screen.

The adults did not want to talk about the matter when I walked out of the bedroom.  They were fearful of the violence that was about to erupt, the worst racial violence of the 1960's.

This link below is of the CBS News coverage just after 9pm Eastern.

First part is the nationwide "Special Report" with Dan Rather from New York bringing in a live feed from Memphis.

Then the 930pm Eastern special re-edited "CBS Evening News" for 630pm broadcast on the West Coast broadcast from Washington with Walter Cronkite.

Cronkite was in DC to leave with President Johnson that night while Rather, the White House correspondent, was in New York having covered Johnson's activites there earlier in the day.

Link below.......

CBS News MLK Assassination Coverage