In the decades following the assassination of a man who would one day have his name become synonymous with racial equality, one woman who stood on that balcony, at that Memphis hotel that day, molded her life in honor of the iconic leader.

It’s 6 p.m. on April 4, 1968. In a minute, on a motel balcony, America’s greatest civil rights leader and most famous advocate of non-violence will be shot to death, reported Rick Hampson for USA Today.

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This story is about what it was like to witness the death of Martin Luther King at the Lorraine Motel. And about how, over the 55 years that followed, it changed the lives of those who heard the shot or saw him fall or touched his blood.

Some of the original witnesses at the Lorraine — Ralph Abernathy, Andrew Young, Jesse Jackson — were not names with national recognition. But they grew in notoriety

Others on the scene of that historic moment ebbed back into obscurity.

They’re like Clara Jean Ester, a college student who was caught up in a local sanitation workers’ strike that fateful day.

Within moments of the gunfire, she was on the balcony, standing with the others around a dying King.

She’s not visible in the infamous photo that captured the tragedy. But within moments, she flew up the staircase to the balcony where he lie. She attempted to staunch the blood flow with the belt she removed from her own waist.

But her efforts were in vain.

Her complete story is at USA Today. 

Editor’s Note: This post ran originally on MONTCO Today on April 4, 2018; it has been verified for accuracy.

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