My experience at Martin Luther King Historic Site ...

My experience at Martin Luther King Historic Site was amazing and thought provoking. There is no cost for admission which makes it really accessible. At first, it was confusing on where to go to enter the site. But a park ranger helped me and guided me on where to go in the site. The park ranger also helped me by giving me a map. The site is self-guided but there are sporadic tours that are available if you would like to wait for them. There are 4 different parts of the site which are MLK s home, his church, his neighborhood firehouse, and his burial site. All are fairly easy to travel to and have little distance between them. As a student, I recommend that other students go to all the sites and pick up pamphlets along the way to maximize your experience. The first site I visited was the firehouse. The firehouse had a volunteer who told stories about Dr. King s childhood activities there. It helped to bring the firehouse to life. Next, I went to MLK s house. The only way to get access inside the house was to receive a free ticket from the visitor center. The tour times were far apart so I was not able to go inside. On the other hand, I was able to sit on the porch steps and explore the building that King lived in which was very moving. The Freedom Hall museum was my next stop. It was an unexpected and surprising part of the visit because it had a beautiful collection of the personal items of Martin Luther King and Coretta Scott King. As a student, it was great to see how these two figures and their legacies were tied together in this space. It was my favorite part of the site visit because it included artifacts of figures who represented what King stood for like Rosa Parks and Mahatma Gandhi. When I left Freedom Hall, I was able to see the King burial site and the Eternal Flame. I liked the symbolism of the water and the flame together. To end the visit, I visited the Ebenezer Baptist Church where King was the pastor. King s sermons played out throughout the church as I walked in. It was a great way to end the tour of the entire King site. As a non-native of Atlanta, it was great to see all of these places that I learned about come to life. I knew that coming to the MLK Historic site would be a beautiful experience. In addition to the experience, I loved that I learned some details that many documentaries and articles do not discuss like King s trip to India and his Grammy win for Best Spoken Word Recording. Despite the directional issues, my experience at the site was a special one and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to learn about the unconventional as well momentous things about King.