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National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis, TN

Photo: Antony-22, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Cropped and resized.

MuseumsIconicHistory BuffRainy-Day Pick

National Civil Rights Museum

Walk through the story of the American civil rights movement at the Lorraine Motel, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was killed in 1968.

450 Mulberry St · Memphis, TN

About National Civil Rights Museum

The museum is built around the Lorraine Motel, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was shot on the balcony outside Room 306 on April 4, 1968. Galleries begin with slavery and follow the movement through the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Freedom Rides, with a boycott-era bus, a recreation of a burned Freedom Riders Greyhound and a garbage truck from the 1968 Memphis sanitation strike. Across the street, the renovated Legacy Building reopened in May 2026 and carries the story from 1968 to today.

  • #civil rights history
  • #history museum
  • #lorraine motel
  • #martin luther king jr

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