March: Book One

Lewis is pulled out of his reminiscence by the mother of the two sons. The woman asks about his college and schooling and is hoping to set an example for her boys about the importance of an education. Lewis recalls how his mother had found a paper that mentioned a seminary Lewis could attend, and she encouraged Lewis to apply. Lewis was accepted and found a job washing dishes in a restaurant to pay his way through school. While he studied, he felt moved to do more to combat injustice. Lewis applied to Troy State University where no Black student had ever attended; when Lewis did not hear back from the university, he decided to write to Dr. King. After exchanging several letters with Rev. Ralph Abernathy and Fred Gray, Rosa Parks’s lawyer and now Dr. King’s, Lewis received a letter saying that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wanted to meet him.

In their meeting, King told Lewis his parents would have to sign an agreement for Lewis to sue, and he encouraged Lewis to discuss what he wanted to do with his family and emphasized they would endure many hardships as a result of Lewis’s actions. Lewis’s parents were unwilling to participate, so Lewis wrote a letter to Dr.