Event Detail

Back to Events
Nine Days: The Race to Save Martin Luther King Jr.’s Life and Win the 1960 Election
  • Date: Thursday, February 11, 2021
  • Time: 5:00 pm
  • Location: Online

Less than three weeks before the 1960 Presidential election, 31-year-old Martin Luther King, Jr., was arrested at a sit-in at Rich’s Department Store in Atlanta. Stephen and Paul Kendrick’s Nine Days tells the story of  the ultimate October surprise: an emerging and controversial civil rights leader was languishing behind bars, and the two Presidential campaigns raced to decide whether, and how, to respond. Three of John F. Kennedy’s civil rights staffers went rogue to free King―a move that changed the face of the Democratic Party and propelled Kennedy to the White House.

Black History Month Programming is made possible in part by the National Archives Foundation, through the generous support of