The First of 40 Civil Rights Markers
On February 25, 2026, the first of 40 U. S. Civil Rights Trail markers was unveiled at Mount Ararat Missionary Baptist Church on Myrtle Street in Jacksonville, Florida. With a nice crowd of people, Isaiah Mack, a Douglas Anderson student sung “Aint Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me ‘Round” and the mayor of Jacksonville Donna Deegan spoke along with other prominent speakers.
It was March 19, 1961 that Martin Luther King, Jr. preached at Mt. Ararat Baptist church on Myrtle Avenue in Jacksonville, Florida, giving his “This is a Great Time to Be Alive” sermon. The event was sponsored by the Duval County Citizens Benefit Corporation along with the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance. King was president of the Christian Leadership Conference and was focused on growing the civil rights movement. His words resounded with resistance but in a non-violent context.
King would return to Jacksonville in 1964 when he met Rev. Andrew Young and his wife at the Jacksonville Imeson Airport on the way to St. Augustine. There had been marches and demonstrations in downtown St. Augustine, near the old slave market and sit-ins at restaurants along with church pray-ins and the like since 1963. Florida Jacksonville’s Times-Union writer, Jessie-Lynne Kerr was a 26-year old reporter of only three months when she was assigned to this story. With demonstrations in St. Augustine a hearing was set to stop the groups and King came with his what he called “nonviolent army” to bring justice.
In St. Augustine, Martin Luther King, Jr. went to the Manson Motor Lodge restaurant asking to be served. When refused, he along with 17 in his group were arrested for not leaving when asked. King was taken to jail. The next day, he was brought to the Duval county jail it is believed for safety reasons. He testified in federal court the following day. Kerr reported that King told the judge the Southern Conference League was “an organization devoted to the task of achieving citizenship rights of Negroes through methods of nonviolence.”
Seventeen days after this incident, the Civil Rights act of 1964 was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson. Jacksonville’s history is significant to document the successes and struggles of the Civil Rights movement.
Sources: Wikipedia, Associated Press, Florida Times-Union, Jessie-Lynn Kerr, Vaughan Publishing, Nannette V. Ramey.