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Auburn Council Rep Doug Brazeal and his wife, Cynthia Bell-Brazeal, discuss the memories and legacy of Martin Luther King, while Bell-Brazeal holds a Christmas card from the Kings addressed to her family in 1964.

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Monthly Publication January 2016

Remembering
Martin Luther
King Jr.

He was one of the ‘uncles’

at family gatherings

By Karen McLean SPEEA publications editor

LAKE TAPPS - For Cynthia Bell-Brazeal, wife of SPEEA Auburn Council Rep Doug Brazeal, the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday is personal.

She recalls the stories of her father William A. Bell, how he and King picked tobacco in the fields of Georgia as boys, and ML (or Mike as he was known) would hang out with her dad when they attended Morehouse College together, and how they honed their speaking skills in debate competitions at Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church.

As a child growing up in Michigan, “we’d be sent back to visit family in Atlanta. At family parties and barbecues, we certainly had no knowledge these were men (civil rights movement leaders) of growing power and influence. They were just like ‘uncles.’ Nothing unusual,” she said.

“I wonder what my father would have thought when they created a national holiday in King’s name – the way it turned out.” He (William Bell) died in 1977 before they started re-naming streets and counties and declaring a federal holiday. “I asked my mother once what she thought of it. Simply put, they never could have expected it,” she said.

Christmas card

Looking at MLK memorabilia from her father, Bell-Brazeal pointed to one of her top three prized possessions – a Christmas card MLK Jr. sent her family in 1964. The card features a photo of the Kings’ children with their dog.

Digging a little deeper, she finds the newspaper her father must have bought after finding out his lifelong friend had been fatally shot while standing on the balcony of a Memphis hotel in 1968.