WASHINGTON — As thousands of people from disparate parts of the country gathered in downtown Washington, D.C., for Donald Trump’s inauguration, Serena Davis made her way to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial.
The day before the inauguration, Davis stood beneath a 30-foot-tall white granite statue of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. among a sparse group of about a dozen people who were gathered in the cold rain.
For only the third time since Martin Luther King Jr. Day was approved as a federal holiday in 1983, Inauguration Day and MLK Day overlapped this year. Inauguration Day has taken place Jan. 20 since 1937, except when the day has fallen on a Sunday. MLK Day is always the third Monday of January.
This year’s connection was not lost on Davis, who had traveled to Washington with friends from her home in San Francisco for the Jan. 18 People’s March, during which protestors marched and rallied in support of womens’ rights, workers’ rights, LGBTQIA+ rights and other causes they believe to be under threat.
“It just felt right to come here,” Davis said.
The memorial, which is run by the National Park Service, opened to the public in 2011. The first monument on the National Mall to honor an African American, it celebrates King’s legacy as a Civil Rights leader who championed freedom, justice and equality.
Demetrius Tyson, from Atlanta, Georgia, was there to show his children the monument. Tyson said he was proud to see a monument dedicated to a Black American alongside all of the other monuments in Washington.
“I have a warm feeling inside to have such a dedication to an African American,” Tyson said. “It’s pretty much unheard of. I don’t see another one around here.”
Tyson, who grew up near Tuskegee, Alabama, said it was important to him for his young children to know the history of racial segregation.
“I don’t want my kids to forget it, what my mother and what my grandfather and grandmother went through,” Tyson said.
Korbin Cummings, who visited the monument with her mother to remember and honor King’s legacy ahead of the holiday, stressed the importance of unity and working toward diversity, equity and inclusion to reach the ideal King preached about.
“I believe that there is a lot of work to be done,” Cummings said. “Martin Luther King talked about the voices of the oppressed and what we need to do to come together to fight against injustices. We need to think a lot more strategically about how we can unify together for long-term goals to bring about equity, inclusion.”
The granite King’s likeness is carved into is called the Stone of Hope. Behind it are two large boulders known as the Mountain of Despair. Cut into the Stone of Hope are the words, “Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope.” This quote is taken from King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, which he delivered in 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial, not far from the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial.
“I hope that what he stood for prevails in the next four years because I do have concerns,” Davis said, looking pensively at the wreaths placed in front of the memorial in King’s honor.
