What to Know
- Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and killed on April 4, 1968 on a hotel balcony in Memphis. Wednesday marks 50 years since the assassination
- Bells will ring at 4:01 p.m. in Los Angeles, the moment the nation lost one of its great civil rights leaders
- The bells will ring 39 times. King was 39 when he died.
Church bells in Los Angeles County rang out at 4:01 p.m. Wednesday in recognition of the 50th anniversary of the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
The bells rang 39 times, signifying the number of years he lived. The time represents the exact time when he died from an assassin's bullet in Memphis.
Institutions where bells rung included the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in downtown Los Angeles, UCLA, Hollywood United Methodist Church, the Korean Bell of Friendship in San Pedro and All Saints Church in Pasadena.
Memorials around the country were planned for Wednesday, marking 50 years since the civil rights leader was slain. King came to Memphis in 1968 to support a strike by black sanitation workers who were tired of dealing with low pay and dangerous working conditions.
He led a march in Memphis that turned violent on March 28, and he went back home to Atlanta. Seeking to prove that non-violent protests still worked, King vowed to lead a peaceful march and returned to Memphis days later.
The civil rights leader was standing on the balcony of the old Lorraine Motel when he was shot on April 4, 1968. He died at a hospital at age 39.
