[Mb-civic] The Real Coretta Scott King - Barbara A. Reynolds - Washington Post Op-Ed

[William Swiggard]

The Real Coretta Scott King

By Barbara A. Reynolds
Saturday, February 4, 2006; A17

It was, of course, accurate to label Coretta Scott King the wife or 
widow of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. But in her own eyes, the label 
obscured who she really was.

Before she met her husband, she had traveled internationally, crusading 
for world peace, arriving at that juncture before Dr. King did. During 
the marriage, she saw herself as a partner, not as an afterthought or an 
appendage. After her husband's death, she was a warrior figure pushing 
aside male-dominated leadership to perpetuate Dr. King's legacy by 
building the King Center and achieving a national holiday honoring him.

In taped interviews over a two-year period, Mrs. King poured out a much 
different version of her life than the public one of a grieving widow 
living in the shadow of a heroic husband. As I worked on her 
yet-unpublished memoirs, she talked candidly, struggling to eject 
herself from a context that has long been misunderstood.

The interviews grew out of a long-standing relationship that started 30 
years ago, when I was assigned to write a magazine cover story about her 
for the Chicago Tribune. I was there when she was poring over blueprints 
representing her vision for a King Center, even as some male 
counterparts condemned her for pursuing such an effort. I was there in 
the basement of their home when a teary-eyed Martin Luther King III 
showed me the bike his father bought him but never lived to see him 
ride. Recently I traveled with Mrs. King, a strict vegan, to a 
weight-loss center in Florida, where, for a week, we ate nothing but raw 
vegetables. For years she never forgot to send me a birthday card. I 
received my last in August.

So you see, she was not only my mentor but my friend, and I know that 
she wanted to set the record straight.

"Before I was a King, I was a Scott," she said. "We were landowners and 
independent thinkers. If I had been a weak, fearful woman, Martin would 
have been forced to pull back or curtail some of his campaigns, but I 
brought to the marriage a spirit of not only my mother's discernment but 
my father's strength.

"I was a partner in the movement. When whites bombed our home in 
Montgomery, Alabama, I was in the home with my infant daughter. We could 
have been killed, but I refused to give in to fear, because I had a 
wonderful role model, my father, Obadiah, who, like Martin, was one of 
the most fearless men I ever met."

Mrs. King was no stranger to terrorism. In 1942, as a child, she had 
seen her home on the outskirts of Marion, Ala., burned to the ground by 
whites on Thanksgiving Eve.

"Through it all my father never hated those who did that terrible 
thing," she said. "He just picked himself up and fearlessly started over 
again. My burned-out home prepared me for the fires next time in 
Montgomery. My father, like his father before him, served as the 
preacher's steward and chairman of the trustee board of our African 
Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. His example of forgiveness deepened my 
understanding of the commitment needed to face and eventually triumph 
with love over hate.

"I had no problem being the wife of Martin, but I was never just a wife. 
In the 1950s, as a concert singer, I performed 'freedom concerts' 
raising funds for the movement. I ran my household, raised my children, 
and spoke out on world issues. Maybe people didn't know that I was 
always an activist because the media wasn't watching. I once told Martin 
that although I loved being his wife and a mother, if that was all I did 
I would have gone crazy. I felt a calling on my life from an early age. 
I knew I had something to contribute to the world. The movement and 
building the King Center, speaking out on important causes, that is what 
God called me to do. I was married to the man whom I loved, but I was 
also married to the movement. . . . I've had the honor of working 
alongside America's greatest spiritual and moral leader. I never saw my 
own life as personal, outside of the collective good. I never separated 
my love of family, church and community."

Coretta King behaved with the dignity of royalty, a quality also often 
misunderstood. "I carried myself in the ladylike fashion that I had 
learned from my mother, who always behaved with great dignity. In the 
South, since black women were so disrespected by whites, our response 
was to push our shoulders back, keep our head high and walk with dignity 
and look as if we had oil wells in our backyard. As a budding concert 
singer, poise and decorum were simply tools of the art, which 
unfortunately can be mistaken for stiffness or for trying to be a prima 
donna. However, as someone from the rural South without many cultural 
advantages, who picked cotton as a child, I have never had any problems 
identifying with my own heritage. I knew for certain that no matter how 
far I would climb, I could never forget my origins or look down upon the 
kind of people who were my own."

As we celebrate the life of Coretta Scott King, let us celebrate her as 
she saw herself: a woman of substance, a partner in "the dream," a 
freedom fighter in her own right who helped institutionalize the memory 
of Dr. King for all people for generations to come.

The writer is an ordained minister, an adjunct professor at the Howard 
University School of Divinity and author of several books, including, 
"No I Won't Shut Up," with a foreword by Mrs. King.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/03/AR2006020302512.html?nav=hcmodule
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