CooperVision MLK Celebration

It gives me such a pleasure to talk about Dr. At the King Junior, and I want to thank all of you who are responsible for having me, because I know we're celebrating his birthday, and I have so many memories of the birthday, but the memories of Mart and the King are with me all the time. I would want to say that that's probably the most Interesting man, I have known, and a rare individual for all of us to have known him. And a real pleasure, because Dr. King improved. He helped to improve. He didn't do it by himself. He helped through the work of the Southern Christian Leadership conference. He helped make people's lives better. Improving their opportunities, making them feel good about the fact that there's some helped his own way, I would say. But he was such a wonderful individual, and I don't say that just because I knew him. But because I knew him, I could say that with gray fervor, Dr. King was the kindest. The most understanding, the most willing person to try to make people happy and better lives improves opportunities increasing. That was the Dr. Martin, the King Junior, I knew. And there's a thought of him that the public would not know, and that was the fact that he was so humorous. He loved fun. He loved to tell jokes. He learned loved to listen to jokes, so Jockeletal moments were very appealing to him. And the part you may not know is that he could tell a story better than most people. He would have inflection the tone of his joke. And laughter was his greatest joy. I guess because he works so hard every day, trying to improve the conditions in America for all of us who were deprived of those opportunities. He loved nothing better than to get with the buddies and talk, light talk. Fun talk. And he was good at it. He could tell it better than most folk with inflections therein as well. But he was serious about his commitment. And what I like most about him is that his life was memorable and his words were alike. Today, I still remember that he used to say all the time. You know, black and white can live together. Black and white people black people and white people, can love each other. And you used to emphasize can And then he'd say sometimes we must. We just must learn how to live together. And if we think about it, these were his words. If we think about who we are, where we came from, The truism there is all of us came from the very first start. God created each of us, each of us. And none of us very decided who we'd be where we'd live, who our parents would be, what household historical drop us in? So we all came from the very, very, very same beginning point. And all we have to do is say that we're all created as Dr. King would say, God created each of us in his own image. And underneath the skin, we were all the same. And he made it look like it's so easy. And there were times when relationships that we formed with people of other persuasions, it was easy. Many times, and I still do have friends of other colors and persuasions. And we get along famously. He used to say we've created this vacuum. This wall we built between us, that we never should have done. That we do better working at tear down those walls of separation. And learn how to live together. And he said, I'll never stop believing. And one of these days, I think I'm gonna be treated with the reality we have done it. And somehow I think that someday Dr. King's words will come true, that we will learn how to live together, and it is easy. I have lots of friends who don't look like me, but we think alike, operate in a sphere, of operation, the very same. And so, when you do have friendships that crossover the color line, we find there's no difference. We're all people. We all hurt when there's pain and suffering. We all laugh, when there's joy. So we really are the same. We can do it. But living and working around with Dr. Marlon duquesne, probably with going out in my life is my best years. Because I saw a man who was committed to his cause. Doctor King believes that we could have this great society. Dr. King believes that one day we'll all join hands together. And somehow I think that before I leave this horse, I'll see that happen. Anyway, if it's just a hope, it's a good hope to hold on to. That the world is big enough for all of us. We can have differing viewpoints, differing viewpoints on issues, but we don't have to fight, and we don't have to hate each other to accomplish any of that. We can do it through love. When I realized that Dr. King was he's been described as the most. Well known person in the world. Even if you didn't find love emanating from everybody. It didn't matter to doctor Ken. He loved everybody regardless. But he helped improve our lives, creating the laws or eliminating the laws that were separating us. We now have fair housing laws passed because of the work led by Dr. Mark Luther King. We've had so many improvements to the lot of a life, because of what was fought with for and in the presence of in the issuance of Dr. Mark Luther King Junior. We'll never forget him, and we can't, but we don't want you anyway. And I think those who have hatred and tree and their hearts would have to just read about him. Know more about the man who was fostering love, The man who practiced tolerance, the man who found a reason to make things better when they didn't start out being right. He tried to write them He was such a kind man, and I spent a lot of time in his and go there, Scott King's home with the children. I was really like an extended member of the family, really. I used to watch him come home from a trip, and he hadn't seen a kid for a few days. And they would play their favorite game. It was not Missus King's favorite, but it was certainly Dr. King's favorite. They would get put the children, there were four children, and he had a kiss spot for each of them, one here, here, here, here, here. And they really protected those spots like they were serious moments in their lives that made them say, no, that's my spot. But he'd come home and said, okay, we're going to play our favorite family game. And a child, they would pull up a chair to the refrigerator. And one kid would get on top of the refrigerator, and the mold was to leap off the top of the bridge, and he's on the floor in the kitchen. And now he promises I will catch you when you jump. Now, missus King would just absolutely nearly die she hated them because she knew at some point somebody was going to miss a step and they could very well hurt themselves. So she hated the game. But the kids loved it because one thing jump off the refrigerator. He would be on the floor waiting to catch them. And then he would kiss them, and he would kiss them in a spot. With four kids, there were four spots -- four kiss spots. And so once he retrieved them from the refrigerator, he would then kiss that child spot. Now to add more human to that humorous encounter. He would kiss him in the wrong place on purpose, and he'd kiss one kid on the white joy, and that no day. That's my spot. And, oh, they would have a tussle over. Why did you kiss her in my spot? That was my spot. Well, by the time they had that little interview before dinner, missus King was practically in death. Because she knew that that was a dangerous fun game. And she would ask her husband, Juan, why don't you get rid of that oh, no. No. No. No. No. No. No. They just had more fun, and because he was extra careful with them. But he found whatever made them happy to see him, happy to be with him, happy to have him home. He did it, because he didn't get a chance to just just stay home all the time. So he would just plan moments when you get to stay with the children. And then he would take them out just like the boys, Dr. King, had a friend who had installed a baseball, I mean football, not a basketball, thing at their house and invited him and the boys over to see it. Well, they started going over there then as outings where the three guys, Dr. King and the two boys would go and play basketball and spend more time with them on that, and the girls it would take to get ice cream and different thing. He found time to pull the family together and especially the children, and it was fun to see that. And it was so wonderful for him, because a lot of times he was just when he comes off of a trip, he would be tired. But he's never too tired to spend time with his family. So he found those family moments. To me, he found out his personality and his personal time. Which I was glad to see as well. To talk about him, Sometimes I find myself talking like in the present tense. I know now for certain that he's gone, I drove him to the airport from his home to the airport to catch his plane as he was preparing to go to Memphis. I saw something and he saw something we'd never seen before. The children never really cared that he was leaving home, because they knew he was coming back. And when he came back, they were going to have fun with him. But somehow on this morning that I came to pick him up to take him to the airport, we found something that was distressing and most unusual. And that was the action of the two boys. Dr King when I drove up, I went in to get him. And they grabbed a suitcase. His briefcase and said, daddy, don't go. They were pleading with him. Dad, don't leave us. We started, well finally, Dr. King couldn't even get the front door open. They'd blocked the door so he couldn't get out. And he said, oh, come on, guys? I'll be right back. I'm just going to Memphis, and I'm going to do a march, and I'll be right back. And Dodge King was able, followed to released a handle and opened the door, got outside on the veranda, and they were still pulling on his coat. Daddy don't go. Daddy don't leave us. Daddy, please stay here. We'd never seen that before. Went down the steps of the front porch, and now they're blocking the stirrups. Daddy. Don't go. Don't go daddy. Just continue till they got to my car. John King got ready to open the door, but now they blocked the door. So he couldn't get in. So now he's pleading with them, come on, guys. I'm going to be late getting to the airport. But I'm coming right back, but daddy don't leave us. Discontinued. Just too long. It never happened before. Then God became managed get the door open and got in. And then they leaped on the front of the hood of my car. Try to keep us from going. Well, once we got going, doctor King was so disturbed He said, I've never seen those children act like that. And he says, have you ever seen this kind of behavior, I was, oh, no. They just think, you know, going and coming is just a part of your day. And it really distracted Dr. King's level of joy he thought. To see the boys pull on him and deprive him of getting in the car because they thought he was leaving and wouldn't come back. Now, that's what we thought. They didn't express any of that. But it was unusual behavior. But as things turned out, they were right, she didn't come back until he came back in a posture that they would rather not remember. But he said to me, I guess they're really missing me more, and I'm gonna do something about my travel. I'm gonna stay home more because I get in the feeling now that this behavior is a result of the fact they're trying to tell me they wanna see more of me, and I'm gonna make that happen. And I want you to help me. He said that to me. Well, they were right. They didn't see many more until they came back. Quite differently from what he looked like when he left. I'll remember that for a long long time. I don't know how much of that they remember. They've heard me tell the story, because I remember it. As if it happened yesterday, I remember every detail of that unusual, rarer and unusual departure. They didn't see him anymore, except. A time when he could not talk to them. Because he was in a state of what he was gone. I'll just put it that way. He was a good family man. He spend as much time as he could afford with the family, found time to spend dates with his wife and spend some of the time and do some of the things that she wouldn't want. So he was a family man, as best he could be, but he was a man of the world. He was called on by everybody. He co pastored the church with his dad. He was a master on Sunday preaching in the pulpit of the Abanesha Baptist Church. And on Mondays, he's taken somebody to dinner or to lunch. Or he's trying to include his mother and father with a visit. They didn't live very far away. The man had so much on his schedule. Trying to meet the needs of his immediate private, personal family. But also meeting the needs of the people, the public. Trying to get people to understand that we're living in a segregated environment, and it takes all of us to pull together, to make a change in our society. He used to say all the time it requires the energy and the thinking and the patience and the understanding of all of us to pull together to make this a better world. And he was so serious about it all. He tried to do it all. And I think the man died from fatigue. Doing so much. But somehow, he never showed that this was too much. But in his mind, I guess it wasn't said everybody should join hands to fight the war, the war that so many of us, too many of us are having to endure. Trying to raise a family trying to eat, trying to make a life, trying to make the world a better place, requires a lot. And so Dr. King's help was needed everywhere just to have people talk to them. About the perils of our society. The man will be remembered for such a long time. Because he did so much good in such a short time. He wasn't here long. He was here just long enough to have us know that, when we think of some of his words, we can put them in action. Because we can't love each other. We can help each other. We can live and make a better war for all of us. And we pull together, we will prove to ourselves that we can do it. Because we've tried it, and we've done it. I would take every opportunity because I wished everybody could have known Martin as a King Junior. When he's in his relaxing moments and telling a story, Nothing was more enjoyable than the laugh at one of his jokes. He's a pretty good joke teller, too, and he'd love to have a few of his friends when they would gather and have a bite to eat and just laughing and talking and telling jokes, those are his pleasure moments I have to call them. But all the time he's sinking. And I remembered when everybody went to Washington for the great March on Washington. They wanted to hope that everybody would come. There were various organizations, all the civil rights organizations joined hands together to try to make one coming together a success. All the civil rights organization we're planning to come and talk about freedom and opportunities we've been denied, the ones we hope to get granted, the ones we've already been granted. Is a people. And I remember that night before the march on Washington. Some of the members who were to be the speakers for the next day were trying to decide who was going to be on first. What was gonna be the order of the program. And Dr. King, who was a little annoyed by that, said, well, listen, gentlemen, they were all men except North at height was a member, but she was not scheduled to speak in the same lineup But Doctor King's admonition to the group was Don't give me a number. Just make me last. You all can maybe have an argument and a discussion about who will be first and will be second. But make me last, because I don't want to be counted in here. Doesn't matter what I'm gonna say. Well, I'm gonna say it whether it's first or last. So just put me in your place on the program. I don't care. Now I remember that, but also think sometimes today. Do we really remember who was first or who was second? No, and I bet if we did a poll, Not many of you would know either, what was the lineup on that wonderful, absolute memorable day? The March on Washington when all of the civil rights groups came together in unity to talk about the perils of our society. And what we can do to make the change and make it better? With your first, second, or third, Dr. King's attitude, it doesn't matter where I am. But you know what? We'll remember who was last. It was Martin Luther King. I have a dream. People called the Dream Speech. He made that speech reform thousands and thousands and thousands of people who had come to Washington DC. To see the leaders in action. To hear the call of the day, hear the promise of America. We don't remember who was for second, third, or fourth. Who remembered who was last. I have a dream. With the title, Well, it wasn't exactly his title, but the content that people remember, right to this day, I have a dream. He's been quoted millions of time, but I have a dream as if that was the almost reach that was made. We've had the good fortune of living in this society, period of time where we knew Mark Luther King Junior personally. I had the extreme pleasure of knowing him privately as well as publicly. I worked for him, worked with him, work to help him, and there were a lot of changes made, and I got a chance to see those changes on fall, and became realities, laws changed because of leadership. Of Martner's King Junior. Attitudes changed because of the philosophy of Martin Luther King Junior. Centers changed because of the preachments at Ebonies of Baptist Church. The strummers preach by Martin of the King Junior. Or the woman or the man he would meet on street he'd take time all the time to talk to people who would encounter him on the street. He would take time to talk to people. And give them comfort for the day because so many people had problems. But he had the reality to know that you can't solve all the problems for all the people all at the time. And so he said, behooves all of us to do what we can wherever we are, and as long as we can. And once we pull together at the people, we can make changes. We can make this a better well, he used to say to ourselves, and we can make this a better world. But the needs of all of us or the ingredients that make us have a reality check that we're now living in a better world because people like Margaret, the King Junior, have to put forth the fight for equality. To fight for better housing, to fight for just better treatment. Opportunities on its way, and then someday we look up and said maybe it's here now because I'm living a better life. Because better jobs are now offered. Opportunities are greater. And people are willing now because of Martin Luther King's leadership, willing now to put forth all the muscle. That's required. To make this a better life for everybody living in it. I'm glad I lived in this time, to get a chance to know him, work with him, listen to him, laugh with him, cry with him, hear the woes of some strangled, somebody's in jail. And he just nearly fell apart when those four children in Birmingham were bummed at a church. That probably shattered him more than anything else. But he lived on this earth, maybe by God to help make this a better world. We had some good moments. We're living some of the goodness that he left for us. Hopefully, we're living to make his dream a reality for those of us who have left. I keep trying. But I hope you're doing the same thing. Follow the steps in the leadership of Dr. Marlow to King Junior. And we will have that better world. Thank you. What a moving recount of the personal interactions of miss Clayton and Doctor Dr. Martin Luther King Junior's life. The inspiration that his life has given to us all brings to light such a powerful reminder of the capacity We all have we all have to one love one another. Excuse me. I'd now like to take this time to turn this part of our session over to the q and a portion of this presentation. Please feel free at this time to submit your questions in the chat box. Thank you so much for joining us today, Clayton, and thank you for such a moving recount of your experiences. Thank you. It's really great to have you here. We are now accepting questions, but fortunately, we have some already pre submitted. So if you're alright, we'll begin with our q and a session. Okay. If doctor mlk junior was alive today, how do you think he would feel about the progress of his efforts in America today? I think he would say, we made some progress. He up to make some of the changes, some of the laws, but changed as a result of the marches and the dedication of some wonderful people who helped put the laws in the right place some time ago. And so those progressive moves have been wonderful for our society. But we know there's more to come because there's more to do. So he would say, well, you made some progress, but those problem will solve Balna. If he were to come now, he thought he would have thought that all of this was behind us. Yet he was a smart man, so maybe he would have known the truth. We haven't moved fast enough. And he wanted so much for us to learn how to love each other. And he said with such passion, we can live together. We can love each other, and he wanted so much to have us do just that. So I think he'd be disappointed, but he'd give us a B Plus anyway for progress we've made. Thank you. What are some words of encouragement or words of wisdom that you can share with this generation's young activists? Young activists were disappointing to me early on because I felt like they were knowledgeable enough to know the real struggles that we had gone through, getting your head beat is no fun, getting beat up. And burned out and killed none of those actions are good enough to make progress. And I think you would have thought we'd learn some lessons that maybe we could use some other devices and some other forces and some other measures to help change our world because he really just did not like violence at all. He would have thought that we'd figure out a way to at least get closer to each other, and maybe in time we learned to love each other. He wanted that so much. I wish we could have given that to him before he left. But he'd be disappointed But he'd give us credit, or continue to struggle, continue to fight the good fight he used to and I think that would have helped maybe encourage people. And I had to see that young people didn't pick up the mantle where we left off. We made a lot of changes with passing legislation and send to it the laws of past to help make life easier and a little better. And for a while, the house began to think that young people had sat down, but I'm seeing now a different picture. I'm seeing now that young people are more active than I once thought. I'm seeing now that the energy is increasing among the people who are becoming enthusiastic about how slowly we're moving toward a better world. And so I'm more encouraged now than I've been in a long time. Thank you. Right? Based on what you know about doctor King and his view of the world at the time. How do you think he would respond to the current day's challenges? Oh, you know, Dr King was a loving man, a patient man, and an understanding man. So he knew human nature, at his best. He'd been around long enough, not long enough for those of us who loved him, but he'd been around long enough to know that we've gotta keep urging involvement. We've gotta keep talking about progress we gotta keep doing progressive acts of kindness and trying to show the world that we can live together. And he would always compliment people when he found something good was a worthy a pat on the back, to give encouragement, and to keep people motivated, to don't stop. That's what I used to say all the time, just don't stop. Even if you're moving slowly, at least you're moving. And so some motion is better than no motion. So he'd give us some credit for today, but he would wish for more. Thank you. And we have a comment from the crowd here. Thank you for sharing your personal insight and stories. What a unique and special gift you gave to us. I think we can all echo that. We have another question submitted here. What organizations do you believe we should support and contribute to that support the ideals of doctor King? That's a question to me? It is. It's in the chat right here. Yeah. Okay. I don't think that he would be partial enough and just mental enough to pick out somebody who belongs to an organization give them the credit. He believed that we have to work together. And I think he said he would say that, you know, if you think this is a right way to proceed, let's gather and garner others to join us, find out if it's a good cause, if it's a good step toward progress, let's pull in as many people as we can to have win the victory of what you think is a good move. And also he would say, There's no such thing as one way, not the way, but a way to make our country see the ways and the victories of our society and then move forward with that. Strengthen it as we go along, and that's how you make it better. And if you think you're right, proceed. I used to hear him talk about a slogan that if you think he can, you will. I like that because it tells us that all we have to do is have commitment inside of our heads and our souls that I can make a difference. Sitting at home is not where you make the difference. Not voting is not where you make the difference. Getting involved is not making the difference. You gotta put all of these measures in place and combine the energies and the resources of everybody working together. If we could get everybody to understand that with unity, we could accomplish so much. And so the more we have, the better we can do. And I think that we will just have to apply those kinds of measures to make things better. Thank you. Thank you for that. We have a message from our president, Holly Schuffield. Thank you for sharing your memories inspiring and challenging us today. On to the next question here, what was doctor King's approach towards balancing the civil rights efforts and his family life. Well, he certainly said, don't do violence. Violence is not the way, he abhorred violence. There's no victory anymore. Now he meant that in every sense of the word, war itself, big wars don't win much, don't go far, individual wars don't prove much. And so if you're not at war, we want to be sure that Dr. King met what he said, we have to combine our efforts. Let's all join hands together. I used to sing a song like Jordan Hans, you know, put your arms around each other. When we have movement evenings, you know, we'd all put our arms around each other and sing, you know, You gotta do better. You gotta do better. It was kinda like a feel good moment that when you join hands, you get strength. And so with strength is when you win. And so I like his approach to problem solving, get somebody else to see your way, convince somebody else that this is the better way. Violence is no way at all. I remember for how distressed he was when he and Stokely Call Michael were good partners at one point. And Stokely Call Michael was a good fighter. He had good ideas and was a smart young man. But one night, he just said to doctor King, listen, brother, I'm gonna have to leave you now. That you have to go this one by yourself. He said, because you think that white people are gonna be one over, I don't share that. He said white people are not right. They have never been right, and I don't think they're ever going to be right. So I'm gonna leave this leave it to you, and I hope you win. It was a painful moment because Dr. King had spoke to Carl Michael, and a lot of the people during that era were really hard workers putting their shoulders together, you know, to garner strip to move forward on a plan that hopefully would win the victories. And historically, Carl Michael was such a smart young man. Light energy, very thoughtful, but he just didn't like the fact that white people didn't seem to join, our dance and didn't like the music, we were playing. I don't mean that literally, but I mean, in a significant way, they had not joined the army of brotherhood and sisterhood. And so he said his patience went up. That was unfortunate, but you can't stop because somebody drops. And so as much as Dr. King hated to lose him as part of one of our strong allies, we had to go on without him in and then had some victories in spite of it all. But you hoped that and Dr. King did, in fact, hoped that we could convince people that we just wake up in the morning with Victor on them Hines, go through the Davis and I'm going to win this. Go through the evening before you go to bed and say your prayers say, well, I didn't win today, but tomorrow is coming. And I'm gonna try again because the tenacity has to be a part of the goal. And the part of the plan include the will and the determination to solve the problem of racism hatred and bigotry. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. That was very moving. Miss Clayton, you speak to the power of fostering love. In your more recent experiences, can you share a moment in which you have witnessed how powerful, fostering love can be? Oh, I think that we finally got young people motivated, I have personal disappointment in the fact that we thought we had a strong movement going with some of the black women I didn't like to title black lives matter because Doctor King would say all lives matter, but it got up to real etnergetic start and somewhere along the way had kind of fizzled in this approach. In this direction. But I think the idea was good that unity, in unity, you got numbers in, but the numbers you got strength. And so the women's movement was very encouraged because now we thought we had everybody out in the wilderness, trying to clear the growth and the stifling efforts that would prevent us from having this great society we were getting further away from the great society. And so he was always disappointed when it looked like things were falling by the wayside, but he had moved on to the great Beyond by the time women's, I guess, the effort on women, whether we're energized to oh, he had already moved on. But I think if you were here, he would applaud it because some effort is better than no effort. And although some areas of the black lives matter went astray, it didn't mean that we lost it. The timing, well, I guess we lost the time and we didn't lose the courage to say it won't work. There's some streamlining that has to be done. But I was encouraged because at least women now were doing things, the young women were doing things that never done before. We had never seemingly got a strong enough hold from young people to fight the battles that we had been fighting as older a generation, but I've been more encouraged when I see now that it's not all dead, I'd looked and used as my yardstick, the election in the last to elections. I was so saddened to see where we were on the idea of voting one of my many jobs when I worked there was to go and knock on doors and try to get up get people to get up and go out and vote. And it was so distressing that give you, excuse like, oh, well, I think my back is beginning to hurt and Oh, I think I've got this, I've got this ailment, and my headache is coming stronger. Given all kinds of excuses why they could not get out and vote, although it was so distressing. Because I said to them, as I went from door to door, haven't you watched television to see Robert CT Vivint, with about eight or ten or more men. On the steps of the courthouse in Alabama, Trying to get us registered. Not voting, just trying to get us first registered to vote. Getting us ready so that when time came, we could exercise our muscle and our volt and make a difference in decisions that we would make. Well, it was very, very, very disheartening when we got lightweight excuses why we weren't voting. But I was so encouraged with the last two elections when people got up, got out, and voted in strong numbers, and I would watch on television. It was such glee when I hear a reporter ask, how long have you been standing in this long run? And a person say I've been here for hours. Well, how long are you gonna stay until my vote is counted? Now there was like music to my ears. And we got results that were very satisfying to the community who wanted good leadership and this last election we did also show wisdom. So I think that maybe more victories can get more results, and I'm hoping we keep working to get more victories, so we have more people trying to open the doors of opportunity, trying to stranglehold the naysayers, and try to open the drawer widely for everybody to turn drawer with Dr. King's called the beloved community. He wanted so much of us to love each other, because he thought if we loved each other, that would be the first step toward working together. And then solutions come after you work together. Thank you. We have time for one last question. Do you think that doctor King Junior's message and legacy have helped other groups fighting for equality? Oh, yes, I do. I think when people read his books, listen to his recordings, read his words, talk to people who knew him, hear speeches that he made, you can't help but be in college like, oh, maybe I can do this. I think it gets people college all the time just that This wasn't the worst thing in the world to do. I can do that. You can follow his leadership. Read his words. Know his thoughts. And I think that would give us the encouragement we need to get in the fight of equal opportunity, to make love a reality for all. And I think he would just follow his leadership even though he's not here to be the banner holder, we can read his words and make victory a focal point. Thank you. Thank you for that. It has been such a pleasure to have you join us today. We are really honored by you being here and joining us at the Cooper Companies from the African Decent ERG, our women's impact network and all of our other fellow g's. We really appreciate you taking the time to join us here today. I wish everyone an inspiring Martin Luther King junior day take some time to really allow his message and what you just heard today to resonate with you on our Monday that we have off in remembrance. Thank you all for joining us so much, and have an excellent weekend. Take care.