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Jesse White Recalls Dr. Martin Luther King Junior
Not many people can say they've been friends with both Martin Luther King and Barack Obama. Jesse White is one of them.

The Illinois Secretary of State, whose tumbling team performs during Tuesday's inaugural parade in Washington, crossed paths with King a number of times during White's college days in Montgomery, Alabama.

King friend and fellow activist Ralph Abernathy was a mentor to White's fraternity and ordered the pledges to attend a church King was helping establish in that city. Attendance swelled from a couple dozen to capacity within a few weeks. Not long after that, Rosa Parks was arrested for not moving to the back of the bus. White participated in the ensuing boycott and carpooling.

White, a scholarship athlete, adds King occasionally slipped him $20 after basketball games. "Things were tough in the fifties," White says.

White was born in Alton and moved to Chicago as a child. He was used to integrated society but encountered, for example, segregated water fountains when he got to Alabama. It was not his last experience with racism; White says he was discouraged from running for Secretary of State because of his race. He's now in his third term.

(Illinois Radio Network)
01 18 09 by Newsroom
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