Chief Osby Shares What Martin Luther King Jr. Meant to Him As Well as Others

Growing up in Shreveport, Louisiana, Air Force Chief Master Sgt. Kevin Osby went to a small church with his grandmother when he was about 5 years old. The air conditioning didn’t work well, so congregants cooled themselves off with paper fans that were placed near the hymnals.

“On that fan, there was a picture of Martin Luther King Jr.,” Osby, the Exchange’s senior enlisted advisor, said during a talk honoring King’s legacy and the civil-rights activist’s influence on Osby and others. “Everybody’s waving this fan because it’s hot in there and the preacher’s doing his thing. At the time, I didn’t know who [King] was, but I knew he had to be pretty important to get his face on a fan. Little did I know the impact this man would have on so many people.”

The young Osby would learn more about King, who was a staple figure in Osby’s house and community. On Monday, the Exchange will join the nation in honoring King’s birthday, which has been celebrated on the third Monday of January since 1986. This year’s commemoration falls on King’s actual birthday, Jan. 15.

Some Exchange associates will have a holiday—but they are encouraged to treat it as something more.

“The theme for this year is ‘A Day On, Not a Day Off: Remember, Celebrate and Act’,” Osby said. “The theme is spot-on for Dr. King, because he literally took no days off in his unwavering pursuit of freedom, equality and peace.”

Osby shared some key moments in King’s life story, including his birth as Michael King Jr. in Atlanta on Jan. 15, 1929. “His father was so heavily influenced by the Protestant Reformation leader Martin Luther that he changed his name and his 5-year-old son’s name to Martin Luther King.”

King was enrolled in first grade at 5 years old—and expelled because his teacher was convinced that he was too young. King’s academic achievements enabled him to skip ninth and 12^th grade. He was accepted into Morehouse College at age 15, graduated at 19 and earned a Ph.D. in theology by the time he was 26. That was in 1955, when King led a boycott of segregated buses in Montgomery, Alabama. The boycott occurred after Rosa Parks was arrested after she refused to give up her bus seat to a white man. A year later, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that segregation on buses is unconstitutional.

In 1960, King became co-pastor with his father of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. “I got a chance to go check out the church,” Osby said. “I took my family there. As soon as you walk in there, it feels like a coldness goes over your body. You can’t even explain it. If you get the opportunity to go, check it out and see the memorials in different areas of the world, especially in Atlanta.”

Osby then talked about King’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” written in 1963. Later that year, the historic March on Washington took place. King and other civil-rights leaders organized the march, in which more than 200,000 people participated in a demonstration near the Lincoln Memorial. King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech and the march influenced the subsequent passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

King received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. At 35 years old, he was the youngest recipient at the time. The next year, the historic Selma to Montgomery marches took place. During the marches in March 1965, protestors walked the highway between the two cities to ensure that Black people could exercise their constitutional right to vote.

“On Sunday, March 7, known as Bloody Sunday, marchers were violently turned back by local police officers,” Osby said. “Two weeks after Bloody Sunday, as many as 25,000 people participated in the roughly 50-mile march over five days. The march led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The act was U.S. legislation that aimed to overcome legal barriers at the state and local levels that prevented African-Americans from exercising their right to vote under the 15^th Amendment.

“I got a chance to check out Selma and the bridge they marched on,” Osby said. “I’ve been to Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery a few times for military education, and our class took a trip to Selma to visit the bridge. It’s another site where there’s so much history. A lot of emotions came over me when I got a chance to check it out.”

On April 4, 1968, King was fatally shot while he was in Memphis to support a strike by sanitation workers. In 1983, Congress established Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which was first celebrated in 1986. In 1994, Osby added, Congress passed the King Holiday and Service Act, designating Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a national day of service.

“It’s a day when all Americans are encouraged to volunteer to improve their communities” Osby said. “MLK Day is the only federal holiday designated as a national day of service. AmeriCorps has been leading this effort for 25 years.”

After talking about King and his accomplishments, Osby shared portions of his own life story and how he was influenced by King and others.

Osby was the second oldest of four children. He, his older brother and younger sister were born within 3½ years of one another. His younger brother came along about 13 years later. His mother was a single mom. “We struggled a lot. I’m the product of every government-assistance program you can think of. We moved six times, all within a 15-mile radius by the time I was 15.”

Like King, Osby reached a milestone at age 15. In Osby’s case, it was getting his first job, at a McDonald’s.

“Getting this job was my way of becoming a little more independent and helping my mother out,” Osby said. “I would take care of a light bill here and there or make sure that I bought my clothes and shoes so she wouldn’t have to worry about my brothers and sisters.”

During his youth, Osby found consistency in his grandparents, especially his grandmother.

“My grandfather passed away when I was 6,” he said. “My grandmother was my hero. She was the rock, she was the cornerstone, she was the matriarch of the family. Everybody gravitated to her for everything. She really laid the foundation for a lot of the goodness that I had in my heart and the way I felt about the world because I saw what she did for our family and what she did for other people.”

Osby said he was raised by his grandmother, her sister and her cousin. “A lot of strong women raised me,” he said.

“Being a part of the military has afforded me the opportunity to sacrifice for other people, to invest in other people, to do things where it’s not about me, it’s about the team. It’s about other folks. That’s the epitome of what Dr. King was. He sacrificed so he could take care of generations of people, including myself.”

At the end of his talk, Osby signed off with three quotes, all attributed to King:

• “I have decided to stick to love because hate is too great a burden to bear.”
• “Faith is taking the first step even when you can’t see the whole staircase.”
• “If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.”

Osby’s talk was presented by Exchange Special Emphasis Group BRIDGE (Building Resources in Diversity Growth of Employees). Marla Randolph, senior vice president of Europe, SW Asia and Africa, and Denise Hunter, vice president of Services – Health & Wellness, are co-executive champions. Judy Hathaway, Quality Assurance Analyst, is the program manager.

To learn more about BRIDGE, click here. To learn more about Exchange Special Emphasis Programs, click here.