Throughout his life, King was known best as a Civil Rights Leader. King was born into a family of Baptist Ministers. King grew up in a time when the opportunities for education and experience were not available to children in poorer urban and rural areas. He was fortunate to have these opportunities. Despite his social standing, King was still subjected to segregation because of his color. Kings entire family was involved with the church and there were many high expectations that King would follow in the footsteps of his father and grandfather. King found that this way of life was not for him. Rather, he wanted to address the social problems he had experienced in the South. His strategy of nonviolent protest brought passage of far-reaching federal legislation that undermined southern efforts to enforce segregation through local laws. His vision of a just and equal society where race would be transcended fired the imagination of many Americans. .
King studied in the public schools of Atlanta, spent time at the Atlanta Laboratory School until it closed in 1942, and then entered public high school in the tenth grade, skipping a grade. After he completed his junior year at Booker T. Washington High School, he then entered Morehouse College in the fall of 1944 at the age of 15. After attending Morehouse College, King decided to attend Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, a very liberal school. While at Crozer Theological Seminary, he studied theology, philosophy, ethics, the Social Gospel of Walter Rauschenbush, and the religious and social views of Reinhold Niebuhr. It was also during this time that King first learned of the nonviolent activism of Mohandas Gandhi. He was elected student body president, was valedictorian of his class, won a prize as outstanding student, and earned a fellowship for graduate study. King was accepted for doctoral study at Yale, Boston University, and Edinburgh in Scotland.