Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968)US Baptist minister and civil rights leader. Throughout his life, King remained committed to nonviolent direct action as a means of effecting social change. The son and grandson of prominent African American ministers, each of whom bequeathed a legacy of activism in the cause of black civil rights, Martin Luther King, Jr., born on January 15, 1929, in Atlanta, Georgia, was the most influential leader of the American civil rights movement.