In honor of the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's death on April 4, 1968, I thought you might enjoy hearing some of the audio from his last public sermon. This talk is entitled "The Drum Major Instinct."

This sermon was preached in the pulpit of Ebenezer Baptist Church, about two months before King's death.

The sermon was an adaptation of the 1952 homily ‘‘Drum-Major Instincts’’ by J. Wallace Hamilton, a well-known, liberal, white Methodist preacher.

NOTE: I have clipped off King's introduction and started the audio of this recording at the point where he begins speaking about personal finances.

To hear the full audio or to read a transcript of the entire speech, use this link: http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/multimediaentry/doc_the_drum_major_instinct/index.html

Enjoy,

Joshua

p.s., there are a few clipped pieces of audio...these are a fault of the original recording. You can read the missing text in the transcript.