New parade route, events planned for Martin Luther King Jr. celebration in Myrtle Beach

When Bennie Swans moved to the south from Philadelphia 15 years ago, he heard stories about how even in the late 1960s, African Americans were still not welcome on Grand Strand beaches unless accompanied by a white person. During those same years, he was serving in Vietnam, fighting as a U.S. soldier for the rights of people in another country while facing the harsh reality that his own race continued to be denied equal rights in his homeland.

“I never met a soldier under gunfire who didn’t believe in God and I never met a soldier in combat who cared what color the person was beside him,” Swans said.

The desire to see people of all races work together for a better community moved Swans and a coalition of individuals to approach the Myrtle Beach City Council nearly a decade ago seeking recognition of the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., national holiday.

“I had not realized there was no official celebration,” Swans said. He said when a coalition of people approached City Council, the idea “touched the hearts” of council members who then approved the associated costs of giving city employees (currently 850 of them) a holiday; a cost that council member Wayne Gray said today carries a six-figure price tag for the city. The first observance was in 2008.

“It was the right thing to do,” said Gray, who was serving on City Council when the holiday honoring the civil rights leader was approved 10 years ago. “There is never a wrong time to do the right thing. I’m just sorry it has taken us this long to make this a day of service.”

Gray said the financial part is nominal in the scheme of things. “So often we talk about race relations just being black and white but this community has thought about others. Bennie has reached out to different races, religious groups and others. Everyone jumps at the opportunity to be part of it and that is a message to me of hope.”

For the last decade, the City of Myrtle Beach has honored King’s memory by holding recognition events that have traditionally included a prayer and awards breakfast and a parade.

Events are held in the Booker T. Washington neighborhood of Myrtle Beach, an area traditionally home to the African American community and where City Manager John Pedersen said the city is working to preserve the history of the area. Projects have included establishment of two parks and a current project to restore the former’s Charlie’s Place, where the city has purchased an abandoned hotel and house that was the site where African American musicians the likes of BB King and Little Richard mingled with locals both black and white at a popular dance club.

The King celebration has grown this year to include a three-day Freedom Rally starting Jan. 16.

Gray said he always felt race relations in Myrtle Beach proper were positive but a decade after development of the MLK events, he sees better race relations, better understanding and better communication among the residents and leaders.

A movement to honor King nationally started four days after his assassination in 1968. Then Michigan Democratic Congressman John Conyers started the effort when he introduced legislation for a commemorative holiday to remember the civil rights leader. King’s wife, Coretta Scott King, founded the Martin Luther King Center in Atlanta and began efforts to establish a date to observe King’s Jan. 15 birthday.

While the first King holiday bill was signed in 1973 in Illinois, it was 1983 when President Ronald Reagan signed a bill proclaiming a national holiday in observance of King to begin on the third Monday of January in 1986. In 1994, President Bill Clinton signed a bill expanding the mission of the holiday as a day of humanitarian service.

Swans, who spent his career developing gang and youth violence intervention programs, along with his wife Marcella and a committee backed by the Carolina African American Heritage Foundation, has worked to expand the one-day celebration. Today it is “three meaningful days geared toward improving the quality of race relations in Myrtle Beach and along the entire Grand Strand,” he said.

Swans said this goal is more important today than ever given the killing of nine church members in Charleston June 17 who were “shot down like dogs simply because they were African American.” A 21-year-old white male, Dylann Roof, was charged with the deaths.

“Surveys and research has confirmed that the majority of Americans—whites and blacks—recognize the need for improved race relations,” Swans said. He said following the Charleston shooting something changed in South Carolina. “It was an amazing reawakening of the positive spirit of dealing with issues of race,” he said.

The 2016 Freedom Rally events will promote that concept plus much more. Three brown bag workshops will focus on small business development and opportunity, an employability workshop and job fair, and will bring leaders together in a Statewide Deliberative Dialogue Forum to discuss building blocks for improving community relations.

Carolina Has Talent, a traditional part of the celebration, will focus on gospel music with the presentation of the Gospel Explosion Musical Tribute to the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Then, Civil Rights Sunday will include a multi-cultural ecumenical service and on Monday, the breakfast will focus on corporate and community awards with the Freedom Rally culminating with a parade starting on 24th Avenue North and Ocean Boulevard.

First held at the Community Kitchen, the initial MLK Prayer Breakfast was moved to the Mary Canty Recreation Center, a center named for a prominent African American leader in the community. The breakfast has grown to include more than 350 attendees. During the event, corporate and community leaders who have supported the annual recognition will be honored.

Event committee member Doris Gleason said the Freedom Rally is “a wonderful way to celebrate the legacy of Dr. King and bring Myrtle Beach people together. It involves so many different people and is so inclusive of everybody in the area.”

Gleason said while the event gets bigger every year and the breakfast location is filled to capacity, the committee feels it is important to continue keeping the event “tied to its roots” in the Booker T. Washington neighborhood. However, Gleason also sees the future of successful race relations involving new ethnicities in the community.

City officials are pleased to see the celebration growth and inclusiveness. Pedersen, who has served with the city for 13 years, supported City Council in its move to give city employees time off to get together with community leaders on Martin Luther King Day and “focus on what Dr. King Stood for.”

“I think it is very important,” Pedersen said. “I think since the City Council made this a holiday for all employees, I believe it has really helped to improve race relations in the community…I’m pleased with the direction I see things going in that regard.”

Michael Chestnut, the only African American member of City Council, agrees. “I think the city’s been reaching out over several years, especially since making Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday a holiday for the city. We reach out to improve relations and do something positive. I think the holiday has meant a lot for the community. Every year you get to know different people. It’s meant a lot as far as race relationships.”

Chestnut said the council’s goal is to bring people together to provide the unity to make the community a better place. “That is what it is going to take to make our community successful,” he said.

This story was originally published January 7, 2016 at 3:43 PM with the headline "New parade route, events planned for Martin Luther King Jr. celebration in Myrtle Beach."