Martin Luther King Jr. Day
On the third Monday of every January, the federal government shuts down for the day to honor Martin Luther King Jr.
The Baptist minister first came to national prominence during the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama. King would go on to become one of the most prominent figures in the Civil Rights movement, founding the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957 and leading the 1963 March on Washington.
The holiday in his honor is timed to honor King's birthday, though it rarely falls on that actual day because of the Uniform Monday Holiday Act, which former President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law in 1968.
Born in 1929, King's birthday is Jan. 15, which in fact happens to be the day that MLK Day will be celebrated this year.
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