Martin Luther King Jr Day is a Federal holiday in the United States Marking as Martin Luther King birthday. It is observed on the third Monday of January each year.

But not all people know who Martin Luther King really is and why it become a holiday

King was the chief spokesperson for nonviolent activism in the Civil Right Movement, which protested racial discrimination in federal and state law. The campaign for a federal holiday in king’s honor began soon after his assassination in 1968.

President Ronald Reagan signed the holiday into law in 1983 and it was first observed three years later. At first, some states resisted observing the holiday as such, giving it alternative names or combining it with other holidays ,It was officially observed in all 50 states for the first time in 2000.

Did you know that Martin Luther King name isn’t Martin, The Civil right leader was born Michael King Jr. on January 15, 1929. In 1934, however, his father, a pastor at Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, traveled to Germany and became inspired by the Protestant Reformation leader Martin Luther. As a result, King Sr. changed his own name as well as that of his 5-year-old son.

Martin Luther king also was imprisoned nearly 30 times. According to the king Center, the civil rights leader went to jail 29 times. He was arrested for acts if civil disobedience and on trumped-up charges, such as when he was jailed in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1956 for driving 30 miles per hour in a 25-mile-per-hour- zone.

What are some things you didn’t know about Martin Luther King?