To many people, Martin Luther King Jr. was a brave leader. King helped lead the Civil Rights movement. Today, many Americans honor him on the National Day named after him, this year on Jan. 16. Martin Luther King Day was first celebrated in 1986.

In the book “Martin Luther King Day” by Ciara Cella, the author recalls that King worked for change, to fix all that was unfair through passive resistance. Some disagreed with King.

Born in 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia, King was shot and killed in 1968 at a hotel in Memphis, Tennessee. King’s tombstone reads, “Free at last, free at last, Thank God almighty, I’m free.” This is a line from his famous “I Have a Dream” speech he gave in 1963 in Washington, D.C.