King Papers Stay in Atlanta
FT.com / World / US & Canada - Mayor�s clout brings King papers to Atlanta: "Mayor's clout brings King papers to Atlanta
By Andrew Ward in Atlanta
When David Redden, vice-chairman of Sotheby's, heard that the city of Atlanta wanted to strike a pre-auction deal to buy the Martin Luther King papers; a 10,000-strong collection of the slain civil rights leader's speeches, sermons, letters and notes, he needed to discover if the bid was serious.
I got the mayor [Shirley Franklin] on the phone and said, Can you really pull this off? he recalls. She said, I raised $3bn to fix Atlanta's sewers. If I can do that, I can fix this.
That conversation earlier this month was followed by two weeks of intense negotiations with the King estate as Ms Franklin, backed by Atlanta's powerful business community, fought to keep Mr King's papers in the city where he was born and laid to rest.
An agreement was eventually struck to buy the collection described by Mr Redden as the most important American archive of the 20th century in private hands a week before yesterday's planned auction for $32m.
The documents, hidden in boxes for most of the 38 years since their author’s death, will be put on public display by Morehouse College, Mr King’s alma mater. Ms Franklin hopes the collection will eventually form the centrepiece of a new civil rights museum.....
By Andrew Ward in Atlanta
When David Redden, vice-chairman of Sotheby's, heard that the city of Atlanta wanted to strike a pre-auction deal to buy the Martin Luther King papers; a 10,000-strong collection of the slain civil rights leader's speeches, sermons, letters and notes, he needed to discover if the bid was serious.
I got the mayor [Shirley Franklin] on the phone and said, Can you really pull this off? he recalls. She said, I raised $3bn to fix Atlanta's sewers. If I can do that, I can fix this.
That conversation earlier this month was followed by two weeks of intense negotiations with the King estate as Ms Franklin, backed by Atlanta's powerful business community, fought to keep Mr King's papers in the city where he was born and laid to rest.
An agreement was eventually struck to buy the collection described by Mr Redden as the most important American archive of the 20th century in private hands a week before yesterday's planned auction for $32m.
The documents, hidden in boxes for most of the 38 years since their author’s death, will be put on public display by Morehouse College, Mr King’s alma mater. Ms Franklin hopes the collection will eventually form the centrepiece of a new civil rights museum.....
posted by Greg L at
1:17 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home