Master Sgt. Perry Martin, center, portraying Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., enters the auditorium escorted by Master Sgts. John H. Brockington, left, and Carlos Goodman. Photo by Master Sgt. Derrick Crawford.
USASMA ceremony honors work, vision of MLK
The U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy honored the work and vision of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., in a commemoration ceremony Jan. 15 on Biggs Army Airfield.
Dr. Maceo C. Dailey Jr., the guest speaker, reminded the students and faculty in attendance to look beyond the holiday that marks his birth each year on Jan. 21. “We’ve got to follow Dr. King’s guidelines and be concerned about the ‘other,’” said Dailey, who is the director of African-American Studies at the University of Texas at El Paso. He went on to say that now it seems that it would have been impossible to think the events of the Civil Rights Era would have occurred without Dr. King being a major player.
“(Dr. King) understood that if you adopted the idea of ‘an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,’ everyone would be blind and toothless,” he said while emphasizing the impact of Dr. King’s non-violent approach.
The ceremony included musical selections from the USASMA Class 58 Choir and a moving re-enactment of Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech by Class 58 student Master Sgt. Perry Martin.
As Dailey pointed to Dr. King’s stance in the late 1960s on other issues beyond civil rights, such as warfare and economic conditions, he said Dr. King would surely call attention to the issues we face today. Dailey acknowledged that progress has been made but declared that we as a society still have more work to do to build upon Dr. King’s message of justice and equality.
“Dr. King should remain our moral compass throughout this century,” Dailey said.