Less than three months before he was assassinated and at the height of his international fame, civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke at Ohio Northern University about the fight for racial justice.
To a crowded room, he highlighted systems of inequality and emphasized nonviolence as a path to justice.
“What is it that America has failed to hear?” King Jr. asked that day in 1968. “It has failed to hear that the plight of the Negro poor has worsened over the last 10 or 12 years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. It has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice, equality and humanity.”
At the time, Sadicka Thomas White was a sophomore at Ohio Northern University and one of only a few Black students enrolled at the school in the small town of Ada. King’s words inspired her to help form Ohio Northern University’s first Black Student Union.
She joined the Ohio Newsroom to remember King’s visit.
This interview has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.
On MLK Jr. coming to Ada
“At first it was disbelief. We did not think that [Martin Luther King, Jr.] would be coming to Ohio Northern University. A graduate of Boston University, a man of national acclaim who met with presidents of all different countries, who understood Mahatma Gandhi.
“Now, I was a sophomore when he came and I was sitting in the front row. I could remember even what I had on. But just to be in the presence of greatness… We really didn't know how great and what impact he would have around the world because, obviously, we didn’t know that he was going to be assassinated less than three months from that time.”
On what it meant to her
“It was one of the times that I felt seen and heard and of great importance at Ohio Northern University. … For 12 years, I went to a school that was predominantly Black. And so I had not come up against some of the overt racial incidents that I did being at Ohio Northern. Because I had never been in a situation where I was in the minority. So, that was really difficult for me. I didn't know what it was at the time. They later called it a ‘cultural shock.’”
“However, that day, because of Dr. King coming and speaking so eloquently, my heart resonated. And it was probably one of the proudest moments that I had during my undergraduate years.”
On forming a Black Student Union
“Well, one of the things that Dr. King said [was] you have to let people know what are your wants, what are your needs, what are your concerns, what are the challenges because you can't automatically assume that they know or they even want to know.
“So, [the Black Student Union] did that. We were peaceful. We asked that [the administration] get a professor or two or three that looked like the rest of the world. We said there should be some people on the board, people of color. So [Ohio Northern] did do that. For the most part, they did attempt to meet our demands.”
On what’s stayed with her
“He said we would have to work together. And that we would have to accept the challenge, the fact that we had come far, but not necessarily far enough … Those words are more than true today.”
“When [King] left, I walked around, certainly with my chest out, not boasting, but the fact that he came and he lifted up people who are oppressed. I'm only as oppressed as I let people believe that I'm oppressed because you might do something to my body, but you cannot necessarily oppress my mind. And I felt like I will graduate from this school regardless of what they think.”
