KING, DR. MARTIN LUTHER JR. Why We Can't Wait. 8vo, cloth-backed boards; dust jacket with extensive tape repairs; small coffee stains on front free endpaper and title page; similar small stain and telephone number on rear end-paper. New York: Harper

KING, DR. MARTIN LUTHER JR. Why We Can't Wait. 8vo, cloth-backed boards; dust jacket with extensive tape repairs; small coffee stains on front free endpaper and title page; similar small stain and telephone number on rear end-paper. New York: Harper and Row, (1964) E10,000/15,000 FIRST EDITION. INSCRIBED TO FELLOW CIVIL RIGHTS FIGURE AND CLOSE FRIEND, JAMES FARMER: "To my good friend James Farmer whose creative and dedicated leader-ship in the civil rights struggle will remain an inspiration for generations yet unborn, Martin." James Farmer, one of six major civil rights leaders during the formative years of the 50s and 60s, joined with Dr. King, Roy Wilkins, A. Phillip Randolph, Whitney Young, and John Lewis. He helped establish and lead CORE and was father of the famous "Freedom Rides" to the South. In 1998, on Martin Luther King's birthday, Farmer received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Clinton. Reflecting on the ride from Montgomery to Jackson, Mississippi at the height of the movement, Farmer said "I don't think any of us thought we were going to get to Jackson I was scared." He did make it to Jackson, where he spent forty days in jail. His efforts, and efforts of those who accompanied him, paid off. On 1 November 1961 six months after the Freedom Rides began, the Interstate Commerce Commission ordered all interstate buses integrated. [SEE ILLUSTRATION FRONT COVER].