Detroit Unveils New Martin Luther King Statue At Hart Plaza

DETROIT — Officials unveiled a statue of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at Hart Plaza on Friday, exactly 60 years after King gave his "I Have a Dream" speech in Detroit, just two months before delivering it in Washington, D.C. at the iconic March on Washington on the National Mall.

Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan joined city officials, Detroit Branch NAACP President Reverend Wendell Anthony and faith leaders to unveil the new statue.

King, the late civil rights leader who led a national movement to guarantee basic and economic rights to African Americans, was no stranger to Detroit. In the summer of 1963, he joined prominent ministers and community leaders for the Detroit Walk to Freedom, a mass march down Woodward Avenue on June 23, 1963.

The march drew an estimated 125,000 participants and spectators, making it the single largest civil rights demonstration in the nation’s history prior to the March on Washington in Washington, D.C. in August 1963.

The march was organized by the Rev. C.L. Franklin, the father of singer Aretha Franklin, the Rev Albert B. Cleage and organizers for the Detroit Council for Human Rights (DCHR).

The walk ended at the city’s convention center, where Dr. King gave the "I Have A Dream" speech while thousands listened inside and outside the arena.