On this day in history, April 4, 1969, just after 6:00 pm, Martin Luther King Jr. was fatally shot in Memphis, Tennessee.  

Dr. King gave his last sermon on April 3 in Memphis saying, “We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop … And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the promised land.”

The day after speaking those words, Dr. King was shot and killed by a sniper. As word of the assassination spread, riots broke out in cities all across the United States.

On April 9, Martin Luther King Jr. was laid to rest in his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia. Tens of thousands of people lined the streets to pay tribute to Dr. King’s casket as it passed by in a wooden farm cart drawn by two mules.