SWOP Helps Commemorate 60th Anniversary of MLK’s March to Marquette Park
On August 5, 1966, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and scores of other activists within the Chicago Freedom Movement marched through Marquette Park on the city’s Southwest Side to protest unfair housing practices and racial discrimination that divided the area. The group was met with a storm of violence, as angry mobs hurled rocks, bricks, and whatever they could find, trying to deter the crowd that gathered in support of peace and equality.
Describing the scene, Dr. King stated, “I’ve been in many demonstrations all across the South, but I can say that I have never seen—even in Mississippi and in Alabama—mobs as hostile and as hate-filled as I have seen in Chicago.”
Sixty years later on Saturday, August 1, 2026, a crowd once again gathered in Marquette Park to retrace the route of that fateful day, in honor of the 60th anniversary of the march.
This time, the day presented a starkly different picture as hundreds of marchers came out in unity to honor the moment, while addressing current issues of voting rights, immigration, and racial injustice.
Communities Partnering 4 Peace (CP4P) partner Southwest Organizing Project (SWOP) was among the participating organizations for the commemorative march. Additional notable attendees included Dr. King’s youngest daughter Dr. Bernice A. King, Mayor Brandon Johnson, rapper/actor Common, political analyst Joy Reid, and a host of faith leaders, community organizers, elected officials, and residents.
SWOP Executive Director Jeff Bartow and more than 30 members of his staff braved the rainy elements as they marched through the Chicago Lawn neighborhood. With powerful speakers and lively musical performances, Bartow said the entire event revived his energy and commitment to building a safer, more equitable Chicago.
“The march was a beautiful opportunity for people to acknowledge Dr. King’s visionary role in building peace on Chicago’s Southwest Side,” Bartow said. “I think we all feel a renewed sense of motivation to complete his mission and ensure that people, from all walks of life, are treated fairly with dignity and respect.”
The full-day event kicked off with a march from 63rd and Kedzie, traveling south into Marquette Park. Marchers came from across the country, some traveling from cities such as Atlanta, Detroit, Charlotte, and New York to take part in the occasion.
Under the theme of “The Fierce Urgency of Now” (a nod to the phrase from Dr. King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech), attendees walked the very the same blocks that, at one time, had been off-limits to Black families looking to purchase homes. Since that time, the area has undergone considerable changes.
However, there’s still much work to be done to provide equitable conditions and justice for residents of the neighborhood and surrounding areas.
“We’re living in a time when human dignity is being dismissed,” Dr. Bernice King said in her remarks, “when truth is being twisted, when authoritarianism is out of control, when democracy is being deliberately undermined. Yet, in the midst of this trembling, we stand on the ground where my father once stood.”
Organizers of the event made the call-to-action clear: we must continue the work of Dr. King, to defeat what he called society’s “three evils” – racism, poverty, and militarism. At a time when much is at stake, and powers are actively trying to roll back decades of progress, the march served as a reminder of the long fight ahead.
“[Those evils] are still alive, still mutating, still menacing our communities,” said Dr. Bernice King. “They hide under new disguises, they show up in policies that punish the poor and systems that surveil the vulnerable, in structures that sacrifice humanity for profit.”
All the more reason, she says, to be valiant in our efforts toward social change.
“We gather together today at a moment of trembling, when the cry for justice has become too loud to ignore, when the winds of history have shifted and called us to stand with courage that does not shrink.”