"I HAD TO UNDERGO A VERY SERIOUS CHEST OPERATION… AS THE RESULTS OF A STAB WOUND": ORIGINAL TYPED LETTER FROM MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. TO HIS FORMER PROFESSOR AT CROZER THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY, DR. ROBERT KEIGHTON, REGRETFULLY TURNING DOWN THE OPPORTUNITY TO SPEAK AT CHAPEL DUE TO CHEST SURGERY FOLLOWING AN ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT, SIGNED BY KING
KING Jr., Martin Luther. Typed letter signed. Montgomery, Alabama, December 16, 1958. Single sheet of white letterhead, measuring 7-1/4 by 10-1/2 inches, original typed envelope; matted and framed, entire piece measures 22 by 18-1/2 inches.
Original typed letter from Martin Luther King. Jr. to his former seminary professor and mentor, Dr. Robert E. Keighton, turning down the opportunity to speak at a chapel service following chest surgery necessitated by a stabbing, signed "Martin."
The letter, typed on Martin Luther King, Jr.'s personal Dexter Ave. Baptist Church stationery and dated "December 16, 1958," reads: "Dear Dr. Keighton: On returning to the office I found your letter of November 17, inviting me to speak at one of the Chapel services in April. When I talked with Dr. Plafker I felt certain that I could accept your gracious invitation to speak at Crozer. Since that time, however, I have found certain difficulties. As you know, I had to undergo a very serious chest operation in September as the results of a stab wound. My physicians have insisted that I keep my outside speaking engagements to a bare minimum for the next year in order to assure a complete recovery. After checking my calendar very carefully, I feel that I have accepted as many speaking engagements as my health will allow for 1959. Incidentally, Dr. Blanton invited me to deliver the Commencement address at Crozer next May, and I had to decline this invitation because of a previous commitment. I can assure you that I deeply regret my inability to come to Crozer next year. I am sure that you can understand the dilemma that I am facing. I hope it will be possible for me to come to Crozer sometime in the next school year. I hope things are going well with you and I certainly look forward, in the not-too-distant future, when we can talk together. Please extend my best regards to Mrs. Keighton and all of my friends around the Crozer campus. With warm personal regards, I am Sincerely yours, [signed] Martin" [unobtrusive typing errors as in the original].
Martin Luther King, Jr. attended Crozer as a second-time undergraduate (he already had a B.A. in sociology from Morehouse) beginning in 1948. At the time, Crozer—though ecumenical—was regarded as a primary educational institution for future Baptist ministers. King went on to earn a (somewhat controversial) doctorate at Boston University, but the years he spent working toward his Bachelor's in Divinity were formative. King began his time at Crozer as an above-average student who struggled with writing conventions. Yet, King was a powerful speaker and received accolades for his preaching. "At Crozer, practice preaching courses brought King some of his best grades and higest approval… A generation later, some of the white students who remembered very little else about King would remember the text, theme, and impact of specific King practice sermons" (Branch). His classmates even elected him student body president and, by graduation, he was at the top of his class academically. King was awarded the Plafker Award as the most outstanding student in his class and the J. Lewis Crozer Fellowship. Still, King's time at Crozer was not without struggles: King nearly married the daughter of the school cafeteria's German cook, but was dissuaded by his friends who cautioned him against interracial marriage. The woman in question proved to be the love of his life and one of King's friends remarked that he "never recovered" from the loss. The lessons King learned at Crozer—including those about the injustice of his situation—stuck with King throughout his life.
Dr. Robert E. Keighton was an important presence during King's tenure at Crozer. Keighton was a professor of homiletics—a subject in which King had shown remarkable early promise and he supported King's growth as an active, thoughtful, persuasive preacher. "Keighton's homiletics imposed order and style on [King's] childhood desire to use big words, in an art form he had studied all his life" (Branch). Additionally, Keighton worked to broaden King's frame of reference, introducing him to St. Augustine and poetry. This literature influenced deeply influenced King's subsequent sermons. Keighton and King viewed each other as friends and maintained contact even after King's graduation and move to Montgomery. King came to be regarded as one of the most accomplished graduates of Crozer and even his former professors were impressed by his work on civil rights. In this letter, however, King is forced to retract his acceptance of an invitation to speak at Crozer. In September of 1958, King was at a department store in Harlem conducting a signing for Stride Toward Freedom, his contemporary account of the Montgomery Bus Boycotts. He was approached by a middle-aged black woman who verified his identity and then stabbed him in the chest with a letter opener. The woman turned out to be a paranoid schizophrenic whose elaborate delusions involved King. While King forgave her almost immediately, the physical damage was done. Surgeon's cracked King's chest open, finding the letter opener's blade was resting against his aorta. The injury necessitated hours of delicate surgery and the recovery proved long and painful. In December, when this letter was written, King was still months from a full recovery. He had no choice but to cancel the majority of his speaking engagements, like the one at Crozer. The stabbing was a pivotal event for King. He credited it with forcing him to come to terms with the possibility of his death and deepened his commitment to the civil rights struggle. King mentioned the stabbing in the last speech he ever made, just before he was killed by James Earl Ray. With original postmarked envelope.
Fine condition.