photo credit: Stephen F. Somerstein / Getty Images
The victory for civil rights leaders in Kansas City, of finally getting a street named after this nation’s African American hero, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, was short lived. Reportedly, Martin Luther King’s name will be removed from one of Kansas City’s historic boulevards, less than a year after the city council renamed it after the civil rights icon.
This was a change that the leaders were longing and fighting for being that Kansas City was one of the largest US cities in the country without a street named after him.
Naturally, when you’ve fought for something for so long and it is taken away, you fight harder to get it back and that is exactly what a group of residents did. A petition was circulated to put the name change to a vote.
Talks of racism being the driving force of this change has made this story go viral. The Reverend Vernon Howard, president of the Kansas City chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, said the King street sign is a powerful symbol for everyone but particularly for black children.