It is not often that this newspaper’s distribution day falls almost precisely on an historic date. But it does today. And it is important to remember. Particularly for young people.
Today, The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would have turned 93 years old. Tragically, he was struck down by an assassin’s bullet at the age of 39 on April
February is Black History Month and it seems an appropriate time to look at the civil rights struggles and Montreal particularly after a year when Black Lives Matter came to the fore and a greater focus on inequities relating to black, indigenous and people of colour (BIPOC) have come into more acute focus. In the tangled urgency of the moment, the American civil rights movement is being harkened back to. Only a few are aware of Montrealâs major links with the civil rights movement.
There were occasions when Montreal played host to major figures in the American civil rights movement. By invitation of Rabbi Harry Joshua Stern, the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. spoke at Temple Emanu-El (renamed Temple Emanu-El â Beth Sholom) in March 1962. More than a thousand people attended the Templeâs sanctuary to hear King speak about a âdemocracy devoid of segregationâ. Eulogizing Reverend King, six years later, Rabbi Stern at a Temple Sabbath service, Rabbi Stern said