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Free at Last! Free at Last!: Martin Luther King Jr. Historic Speech “I Have a Dream”

This is one of my favorite speeches of all time by this prominent American civil rights leader. Kudos to a certain PaulfromStokeUK for composing and blending the music so beautifully to this speech. So empowering, inspirational, emotional and beautiful! The text of his partial speech as follows:

“…So even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow. I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up… live out the true meaning of its creed. We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal.

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will they be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right down in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plains and the crooked places will be made straight and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.

With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.

With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God’s children be able to sing with new meaning “My country ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!”

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

But not only that, let freedom, ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tenneessee.

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi, from every mountainside.

Let freedom ring,

And when this happens,and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old negro spiritual, “Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.”

Chinese & Greek Civilizations through Documentaries

Roman Civilization: An Outline

Roman Civilization, Ca. 753 BC- 300 CE
Roman history divided into three broad chronological periods:
 Kings in Rome 753 - 509 BC-often foreign kings
 Roman Republic (509-31 BC) around 509 the Romans expelled their Etruscan kings, and set up a republic
 Roman Empire (31 BC - 300 AD)
Kings in Rome 753 - 509 BC
 For its first several centuries, Rome was ruled by kings, often foreign kings.
 The most important of these kings were Etruscan.
 Etruscans were a mysterious people in N. Italy - possibly originally from Asia Minor.
 Romans learned a lot of things from the Etruscans (McKay 137)
 Etruscans gave them their (and our) alphabet (adapted from the Greek)
 Gladiator games
 Finally around 509 BC, the Romans expelled their Etruscan kings, and set up a republic - i.e. rule by the public, instead of by monarchs
REPUBLIC
 The Roman republic was not a direct democracy (like Athens)- but a representative government where wealthy Romans had more votes than poor ones.
 Senate - most important organ of government -10 % of pop.
 300 men, who owned a certain amount of property, and had held high office
 Only advisory role in theory but in practice governed Rome
ROMAN ACHIEVEMENTS
 Roads, bridges, aqueducts, baths, theaters and arenas.
 Monuments e.g. the Colosseum, Pont du Gard and Pantheon.
 Roman architecture – influenced by Greek architecture.
 Developed concrete, a powerful cement (from volcano ashes mixed with water) – chief Roman building material.
 Efficient and durable travel network. Paved road

Greek Civilization: An Outline

MAJOR PERIODS
 2000-1100 BC Mycenaean Age
 1900-1300 BC Minoan Civilization (another civ on Crete)
 1100-800 BC The Dark Ages
 800-500 BC The Archaic Period
 500-325 BC Classical Period
 338-323 Macedonia’s Dominance
GEOGRAPHY
 At the tip of European mainland
 Had very little suitable lands for cultivation
 No broad river valley, no level plain
 Its geography encouraged political fragmentation, each people in river valley developed their own identity
Mycenaean Age
the first few hundred years of Greek civ is known as the Mycenaean Age
 Mycenaean learned a lot from the Minoans on the island of Crete
 by 1400 destroyed much of the settlements of the Minoans
 What happened to them? Civil war/internal fighting, weakened themselves they were conquered by barbarians from the north ca. 1100
 Greek pen. Declined known as the dark age, cultural regression
DARK AGES
 Written records disappeared, cultural regression
 Intellectual development was limited
CLASSICAL PERIOD
 Greek accomplishment culminated in the Classical Age 500-325
 Throughout the classical period, Athens was the political & cultural leader of more than 200 city-states, which fought with each other for political dominance
 Two major powers- Athens & Spartans
 Athens & Sparta remained united-Persia
 Athens victory over Persia in Two Persian Wars (490 & 480 BC) led democratic Athens to attempt to dominate other city states
 This created an intra-Greek conflict- The Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC)
 Ended with Spartan victory, but in reality it weakened the Greeks as a whole
 After Spartan victory, the Greeks fought among themselves sporadically-further weakened themselves
 This paved the way for the rise of Macedonia (north of Greece)
 King Phillip= by 338 established his hegemony over Greece
 336-323, Alexander the Great reigned-conquered Egypt, Persia, India-retaining key elements of Greek culture
CLASSICAL PERIOD
 In this period Athens reached its greatest political and cultural heights:
 the full development of the democratic system of government under the Athenian statesman Pericles;
 the building of the Parthenon on the Acropolis;
 the creation of the tragedies of Sophocles, Aeschylus and Euripides;
 and the founding of the philosophical schools of Socrates and Plato.
GREEK LEGACY
 Founders of philosophy as a rational exercise
 Literary, athletic & arts provided foundation for later western civ.
 Mastery of sculpture, architecture, poetry, drama
 Legacy of Greeks vs. Romans
 Debt to Greeks: democracy; philosophy; history; geometry; athletics; drama; sculpture
 What do Americans - owe to the Romans?
 republic - senate - citizenship (something that can be granted)
 city planning - grid-pattern of Chicago roads;
 sewers (manholes)
 concrete - mixing ground stone with mortar to use in arches -
 the arch (good for aqueducts and sewers)
 Roman Catholic church
 months - September (7th month); July (Julius Caesar); August (Augustus Caesar), so on
 Roman new year’s on January 1
 Shape of our football stadiums - Roman amphitheatre
 porches in back of our house
 jurisprudence - law as a profession; separation of civil and criminal law
 The Greeks developed three architectural systems, called orders, each with their own distinctive proportions and detailing. The Greek orders are: Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian