Tags: Beale Street Memphis Memphis Music Tennessee neon sign sign signage
'Look at me,' said Glenn. 'I'm the Hulk.'
I met Glenn while on a street photography walk in downtown Memphis. We struck up a conversation.
Tags: Memphis Tennessee downtown portrait street photography street portrait
Tags: segregation Jim Crow laws assassination Memphis civil rights Green Book Tennessee signage National Civil Rights Museum motel for blacks Lorraine Motel Martin Luther King Jr. United States
Artist: Marcellous Lovelace
---
I took this at night in Memphis before the crowds arrived the following morning to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
This is the story behind the mural. Two black sanitation workers were crushed dead by a compactor of a garbage truck in 1968. The city of Memphis refused to compensate their families for the workers’ death and the truck's lack of safety equipment. In response, Martin Luther King Jr decided to become involved with Memphis' sanitation workers, who were mainly black. He came to Memphis to lead the sanitation workers for better working conditions and wages to highlight the economic plight of the black man in America. The slogan of the marchers was "I am a man."
Weeks after King was assassinated in a hotel near this mural, the Memphis sanitation union won better safety conditions and higher wages for their members.
Tags: Martin Luther King Jr. Memphis Tennessee improve worker safety labor union martial law mural night photography sanitation workers’ strike strike wall art I am a man black history American history Marcellous Lovelace
Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated across the street on April 4, 1968 on the second floor of the Lorraine Motel, Memphis, Tennessee from where this gate currently stands.
Tags: Age 39 April 4 1968 MLK Day Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King holiday Memphis Tennessee assassination civil rights leader martyr shot b&w photography Lorraine Motel Lorraine Motel National Civil Rights Museum