Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial, Washington, D.C.

 

President Obama is invited to speak at the August 2011 dedication of D.C.’s first nonpresidential memorial, which occupies several acres of the Tidal Basin.

Visitors approach the site through a narrow channel of boulders called the Mountain of Despair, which opens to a larger plaza, meant to suggest the difficult challenge of civil rights. Inside the plaza, a crescent-shaped inscription wall is emblazoned with MLK’s iconic sermons and writings. The masterminds behind the memorial are from McKissack & McKissack, an African American, female-owned architecture firm.