We Shall Overcome —A crowd of about 70 joins in singing the familiar civil-rights anthem at the culmination of the Dr. Martin Luther King Day Celebration, held Jan. 15 at the Alleghany County Courthouse. The gathering included ministers, government officials and other local notables, as well as several Alleghany High School students, excused from school long enough to attend the noontime ceremony. The group had gathered to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

About 70 attend first-annual MLK Celebration in Alleghany

"I was very pleased with the turnout," said Leslie Choate, one of the organizers of last week's Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration, the first of its kind in Alleghany County.

She described her thoughts at the program's conclusion: "This is it, this is the dream we have: blacks and whites sitting together in peace and unity. The word that came to my mind was ‘Wow.'"

Choate is part of Progressive Friends Group, a fairly new organization which helped sponsor the celebration.

Enacted in the 1980s as a federal holiday to be observed on the third Monday in January, Martin Luther King Jr. Day was observed as an official county holiday in Alleghany for the first time this year. The Alleghany County Board of Commissioners last year approved the holiday designation.

Organizers choose Jan. 15 — the actual date of King's birth — rather than Jan. 20, the legal holiday, for the celebration. Choate explained that choice was made, with the program held at noon, in order to ensure a good crowd for the first-time event.

"Normally when people have a day off, they do other things," she commented.

The observance was initially slated to take place on the front steps of the Alleghany County Courthouse. However, with temperatures not getting above the 20s, even at high noon, the program was moved indoors, where a crowd of about 70 filled the courtroom.

Local religious, government and community leaders offered reflections on the life of the slain civil rights leader and the commemoration of his birthday.

"There Had Been a Change"

The Rev. Grace Wilkins gave opening remarks. "I was in Alabama and Mississippi a few years ago. We were able to eat at all the restaurants and go anyplace we wanted to. There had been a change," she said.

"Martin Luther King chose to identify and give his life for those who had been left out."

The Rev. Stephen Ray next offered an invocation.

Referring to King, Sparta Mayor John H. Miller said, "It was his leadership that inspired changes between blacks and whites. We have been blessed in Alleghany County in that we have always had good relationships."

A Personal Story

For his remarks, Alleghany County Commissioner Patrick Woodie called on his own family history, drawing a parallel between the 1968 assassination of King and the killing of Woodie's maternal grandfather 20 years earlier.

"In the case of both deaths, racial tensions ran high in reaction to the shootings. Charlie Shepherd was killed by a neighbor who happened to be very intoxicated at the time, and who also happened to be a black man. To my knowledge, he is the only Alleghany man to ever be executed for capital murder by the state of North Carolina," Woodie said.

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