By Larry Gossett
King County Councilmember, District 2
Monday, January 18, is the 33rd consecutive year Americans of good will plan to celebrate the legacy of the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. As I reflect on his legacy and his impact on inspiring multi-racial social and economic justice movements throughout the Pacific Northwest, I am in awe of the many ways his memory has shaped our political activism over the last three decades.
I immediately think about the marvelous interaction and togetherness promoted among the Black community putting up Martin Luther King Jr. signs over Empire Way signs and shouting inspirational chants led by Eddie Rye Jr. and Richard Brown, that went something like, “We won’t wait, MLK Way-Now! We won’t wait, MLK Way!-Now!” The chants reflected our impatience with the Mayor and City Council half stepping and delaying a vote to formally change the street Empire Way to MLK Way.
We were not having it!
In the summer of 1983, we organized a valiant and dynamic commemorative rally and march at Garfield to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the great Civil Rights March on Washington in 1963, where more than 10,000 (half of whom were Black) demonstrators joined us. We were feeling our power. We weren’t to be messed with!
We are the only community in the nation where thousands of grassroots community activist, progressive Blacks, Latinos, Indigenous Peoples, Asians and Whites have merged to annually build the most grassroots and authentic salute to Dr. King’s legacy.
As a local politician, I have traveled to many areas of the country and I am aware of no other community where such a grand grassroots salute to honor Dr. King’s legacy occurs every year. For many years I was involved in organizing many Martin Luther King Jr event themes focusing on local issues important to folks in Seattle. In 2002, 7,000 participants at the annual Martin Luther King Celebration March and Rally marched to the Seattle Chamber of Commerce where we forced a meeting with its leaders. We demanded an increase of jobs for African Americans and other historically disadvantaged people in our community. As a result, the Chamber made a commitment to find hundreds of jobs for the unemployed. The Chamber went further and hired a community leader from the Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Committee, Herman McKinney, to be the director of the newly created Urban Enterprise Center. The results of our efforts to pay tribute to Dr. King, resulted in jobs for many Black people.
One of the significant accomplishments of the annual salute to Dr. King’s legacy began in 1999 at Garfield High School during the Martin Luther King March and Rally. Eddie Rye Jr. turned to me in front of the crowded gym and demanded that I sponsor an ordinance changing the King County logo from an imperial crown to the image of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Eddie argued that in 1986 the county’s name was changed to honor of Dr. King. The crowd responded with wild applause. It took several years and enormous community pressure to make the image of Dr. King our county logo. In 2006, the logo and namesake was officially changed.
I want the community to know changing the logo from the imperial crown to the image of Dr. King – a symbol of civil rights recognizable around the world – would not have happened without the leadership of the Martin Luther King Celebration Committee. We are very proud that now people from all over the world see the picture of Dr. King as the official logo of this great County.
In conclusion, I want to thank the Seattle Medium Newspaper, because from day one, it supported our community salutes to Dr. King’s legacy. And the Medium has played a profoundly important role in our County having more success than any other at paying tribute to our great leader Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
