On August 28, Washington D.C. wasn’t the only city celebrating the dreams of Martin Luther King Jr. 50 years ago. At court square, here in the ‘Burg, another, albeit smaller, celebration was taking place.

Local reggae and soul artist, HHS alum Ronnie Brandon read the “I have a dream” speech, with a passion matching King’s in 1963.

“I always grew up singing in the choir and reading scripture in church every morning, and eventually the Martin Luther King speech by the time I was in sixth or seventh grade,” Brandon said.

“One thing led to another, people in the community saw me do it in the church and it expanded to outside of the church.”

Eventually, Brandon read the speech to HHS as a senior in high school. It wasn’t until this year that he performed it again first at the African American festival and again at the 50th anniversary of King’s speech.

“I had a spiritual awakening. I took a 20 year leave, and it was time for me to put [the speech] back on the map,” Brandon said.
He hopes to continue to perform it in the future.

“I plan on touring some universities throughout the country and offering myself up [by presenting the ‘I have a dream’ speech],” Brandon said.

Fred Gibson, however, saw the speech in person.

“I was in the [March on Washington],” Gibson said. “I was a pastor at a small church in Brooklyn, New York and a large part of the baptist population in New York city went; we took six trainloads.”

Gibson knew King from seminary school and went to the March on Washington partly to make sure he was safe.

“I had known [King] for a long time,” Gibson said. “I was worried about his life expectancy, and his safety.”

Gibson grew up in the South and was no stranger to racial prejudice. He moved away from home as soon as he could.

“I’m from Selma, Alabama. I was reared in the home of a clansman so the keynote of my life was to leave Selma. And I did,” Gibson said.

To this day, Gibson is still creating a rumpus in the community.

“I’m in the group that worked on changing the name of [Cantrell Avenue to honor King]. We’re going to kind of stick together and do other heinous things,” Gibson said with a chuckle. “We haven’t been dismissed as a task force yet, so we’re not going to mention it to them, we’re just going to keep doing things.”

Brandon and Gibson, along with about 100 others gathered to celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his words, through song, story and King’s own words.

Listen to Brandon’s delivery of the speech below:

[soundcloud]https://soundcloud.com/newsstreakonline/i-have-a-dream-speech-as[/soundcloud]