On a hot, humid September day, I walked into Martin Luther King Jr.’s birth home, a two-story Queen Anne style house on Auburn Avenue in Atlanta, entering with a group of visitors from all over the world. Our tour guide was friendly and animated, but I found myself frustrated with his portrayal of the family story, surely a script he was simply repeating.

Of course Martin Luther King Jr. was the center of most of the tales, and then came stories about his father, the great Reverend Martin Luther Sr. What frustrated me was the lack of attention being paid to his mother, Alberta Christine Williams King. This was her childhood home. It was the home where she’d grown up in her parents’ lessons of faith and social justice, the home where she’d mastered her instruments, the home where she’d birthed her children in a room on the second floor. This home held stories of her life that were glossed over.