Parades and special events will mark Martin Luther King Jr. Day in America on Monday, Jan. 19, as Americans remember the slain civil rights leader.
Government buildings, bank, public parks and schools are closed today. Museums and visitor’s centers are also closed, but the Martin Luther King Center in Atlanta is open.
The holiday was signed into law by President Ronald Regan in 1983. It was officially observed as a holiday 3 years later.
King was born in Atlanta on Jan. 15, 1929. He was killed by a gunman on April 4, 1968 at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. He was 39.
Atlantans observed MLK Day with a series of special events over the weekend and today. The sites that make up the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park & Preservation District are open today.
After several years of renovations, MLK’s Birth Home reopened to the public last year. The Birth Home tour begins at 10:00 am and the last tour is 5:00 pm. The 30-minute tour is conducted every hour (7 days a week).
The King Center advises visitors to get there early to avoid the long lines on King Day. Only 10 persons are permitted on one tour. Groups can reserve up to three spaces (30 persons) the day of their tour.
The address is 501 Auburn Avenue, NE., Atlanta, GA 30312. Call 404-331-6922 for information.
Dr. Bernice King, MLK’s youngest child, called for “urgency” as she announced plans for MLK Day in Atlanta 2 weeks ago.
Dr. King called King Day a “saving grace” as the world is seemingly on the brink of another world war.
“This is not the hour to shrink. This is the hour to rise,” Bernice King said during the annual news conference ahead of the 2026 King holiday observance.
“We are living in a time when violence, displacement and dehumanization are being normalized,” she said, before referring to the ICE shooting of a 37-year-old mother in Minnesota as “heartbreaking and unacceptable.”
“People are anxious, weary, retreating into silos, tribes… and echo chambers because despair has convinced them that hope is naive and community is impossible,” she said.
