In 1960, a presidential election year, the race was between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon, and civil rights leaders were dismayed by how little attention the candidates were giving to the unrest happening in the South. So one civil rights leader in Atlanta, Lonnie C. King, came up with a plan to change that. To build momentum, he turned to his childhood friend, Martin Luther King Jr., for support.
Lonnie came to StoryCorps in 2015 with his friend, Sarah Cook, to talk about his involvement in the boycott of downtown Atlanta in 1960, and to reflect on his life’s work.
Lonnie died just a few years after this recording at the age of 82.
This broadcast is supported in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Originally aired January 17, 2025, on NPR’s Morning Edition.