A Place to Land: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Speech That Inspired a Nation, Wittenstein Barry

Much has been written about Martin Luther King, Jr. and the 1963 March on Washington. But theres little on his legendary speech and how he came to write it.

Martin Luther King, Jr. was once asked if the hardest part of preaching was knowing where to begin. No, he said. The hardest part is knowing where to end. Its terrible to be circling up there without a place to land.

Finding this place to land was what Martin Luther King, Jr. struggled with, alongside advisors and fellow speech writers, in the Willard Hotel the night before the March on Washington, where he gave his historic I Have a Dream speech. But those famous words were never intended to be heard on that day, not even written down for that day, not even once.

Barry Wittenstein teams up with legendary illustrator Jerry Pinkney to tell the story of how, against all odds, Martin found his place to land.