Coretta Scott King was an American author, activist, and civil rights leader. The widow of Martin Luther King, Jr., Coretta Scott King helped lead the African-American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. King often participated in many of her husband's exploits and goals during the battle for African-American equality. King met the future civil rights leader while in college and the two quickly escalated to the center of the movement. Mrs. King played a prominent role in the years after her husband's 1968 assassination when she took on the leadership of the struggle for racial equality herself and became active in the Women's Movement and the LGBT rights movement. King founded the King Center and sought to make his birthday a national holiday. King went through several procedures and was put down many times, before, in the mid-1980s, she finally succeeded with Ronald Reagan's signing of the legislation legalizing Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. She expanded her views to include opposition to apartheid and tried to establish homosexual rights as being part of her husband's wishes. King became friends with many politicians before and after her husband's death, most notably John F. 

April 27th, 1927 in Marion  /  Died:   Jan 30th, 2006 - at the age of 78, complication from a stroke