Even Martin Luther King Jr. Got a 'C' in School

If you ask a child, "who was Martin Luther King, Jr.?" and the answer is, "he freed the slaves" – here's a chance to teach more about one of Boston's most important alumni. 

Ryan Hendrickson remembers hearing that response once, from a very young student on a tour of the library at Boston University. As the assistant director for manuscripts at BU's archival research center, Mr. Hendrickson and his coworkers are the keepers of the collected papers that Reverend King donated to BU in 1964.

For the holiday in King's honor Jan. 16, special events around the city reflect the civil rights leader's deep connections to Boston. But at BU, a small slice of King's archive is on permanent exhibit and open to the public year-round.

Tucked inside BU's main Mugar Library at 771 Commonwealth Ave., the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Reading Room provides an intimate introduction to King's life and studies while in Boston and as he vaulted to national prominence, right after earning his doctorate from the School of Theology at BU in 1955. King's briefcase, correspondence with Mohandas Gandhi's son, telegrams, and letters from his school days and beyond are displayed in cases surrounding tables and chairs for study. In a 20-minute video, King's 1950s Boston contemporaries, now older men and women, give dimension to their friend that goes beyond the annual soundbites from King's "I Have a Dream" speech. When "coming into the room, people have a notion" of who MLK was and what he means and "some of that gets challenged," says Hendrickson.

While few of King's personal effects are in the collection, at 35 years of age he already knew that his voluminous papers should be preserved for future scholars. (That year, King became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, and the Civil Rights Act was signed into US law.) His alma mater, King believed, would provide needed attention to the more than 80,000 documents that make up his archives at BU. King himself explained the choice at a press conference in 1964, saying, "… It was this university that meant so much to me, in terms of the formulation of my thinking, and the ideas that have guided my life …." As part of BU's Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center, King's papers are the most frequently consulted of the Center's 2,000 different archives.

One of the most interestingly detailed objects on display is King's BU transcript, its blue cardstock typewritten with course names; his last street address corrected in pencil.  While in grad school here, he was mostly an A-and-sometimes-B student. But in a philosophy course called "formal logic," he earned only a C. It's not a piece of information to topple an icon, but inspiration about effort and greatness. "Here's someone who's not perfect," a small reminder that a powerful leader doesn't start out "fully formed," says Hendrickson.

And if you need a current-day reminder of King's far-reaching influence, a 1950s-era comic book with MLK's portrait on the cover (on display here at the library) had a role in last year's Egyptian revolution. Dalia Ziada, an Egyptian rights activist, translated the comic into Arabic after learning in some detail about King's civil disobedience and nonviolent resistance. Ms. Ziada is the Egypt office director of the American Islamic Congress (AIC), whose new cultural center opened at 38 Newbury Street last month. While the AIC printed the first Arabic edition in 2008, Ms. Ziada was also present in Cairo's Tahir Square in 2011 distributing more copies of the book, as 18 days of protests forced President Hosni Mubarak to step down last February. 

The comic book tells the story of King and the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955. The protest that started with Rosa Parks – just months after King graduated from BU – ended with a US Supreme Court decision declaring unconstitutional the segregated buses in King's adopted Alabama. From Tahir Square to Occupy Wall Street, there's a connection to Dr. King and the methods of effecting change he espoused and taught. Says Hendrickson, acts of civil disobedience "come directly from King, and Gandhi before him …." And as one old, 10-cent comic book demonstrates, "these things have power for a lot of people."

About this column: Drop in for a discussion about the latest parenting topics, answer questions, share advice, and get to know fellow moms, dads, grandparents, and guardians in your neighborhood.