Growing up in the South was thought-provoking to say the least.

We moved from a nice apartment overlooking the Hudson River, just spitting distance from the George Washington Bridge in Washington Heights, New York City, to Hot Springs, Arkansas, a beautiful national park that produces the only non-volcanic geothermal springs of such high quality in the United States.

It was April 5, 1968, the morning after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was slain. As an on-air announcer on KGUS-FM, we received word from the authorities to be expecting possible violence.

At that same time my father, and Orthodox priest, and my mother brought in to stay with us two seminarian graduate students from Nansana, a parish in central Uganda. I picked up a little Luganda, but I couldn't teach them any English because they were already fluent, with a very sophisticated, soft English accent. It surely wasn't the language spoken around this confederate state.

Get our free mobile app

Hot Springs attracted a lot of folks to move there from Chi-Town (Chicago), and that helped ease the "good ol' boys" strangle hold on the area.

On that day, a convoy of dust-ridden trucks, flying the confederate flag and occupants fully armed, paraded up and down Central Avenue. Fearing for all our safety, my family and I discreetly went out the back with the seminarians to our church next door. There, some neighbors weren't happy that we welcomed the two Ugandan theology students.

I can tell you that the fear inside my stomach was painful and very deep down. I remember my dad and our guests donning their black vesper robes, and holding a memorial service of prayers for the executed MLK, and a world full of devoted brothers and sisters.

LOOK: 50 essential civil rights speeches

Many of the speakers had a lifetime commitment to human rights, but one tried to silence an activist lobbying for voting rights, before later signing off on major civil rights legislation. Several fought for freedom for more than one oppressed group.

Keep reading to discover 50 essential civil rights speeches.

LOOK: 28 Modern Black History Makers & Moments

LOOK: Here are the biggest HBCUs in America

More than 100 historically Black colleges and universities are designated by the U.S. Department of Education, meeting the definition of a school "established prior to 1964, whose principal mission was, and is, the education of black Americans."

StudySoup compiled the 20 largest historically Black colleges and universities in the nation, based on 2021 data from the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics. Each HBCU on this list is a four-year institution, and the schools are ranked by the total student enrollment.

More From WBSM-AM/AM 1420