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Utah was the last state to recognize MLK Day, after Salt Lake City honored King by renaming 600 South.
Salt Lake City still celebrated the civil rights activist and leader—with rallies, marches and a panel of Utah religious leaders hosted by the J. Willard Marriott Library.
This year, Martin Luther King Jr. Day was a bit overshadowed by the inauguration of President Donald Trump. But Salt Lake City still celebrated the civil rights activist and leader—with rallies, marches and a panel of Utah religious leaders hosted by the J. Willard Marriott Library.
While MLK Day was approved as a federal holiday in 1983, Utah was the last state to recognize it, almost 20 years later. In 1985, Terry Lee Williams—Utah's first African American state senator—introduced a bill for lawmakers to approve changing Human Rights Day to Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
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