Sixty years ago, on June 23, 1963, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was in Detroit when many first heard the words, "I Have a Dream."
The message is so powerful that Motown Records Founder Berry Gordy created an album so people could forever have a keepsake of that historic day.
Today, not many people have that album. It's a rare, if not impossible get – the voice of King coming from a record player.
It was titled "The Great March to Freedom" and was complete with historic photos from the march down Woodward Ave. and his speech to a jam-packed audience with no room to spare at Cobo Hall.
The album is now owned by Dr. James Bull, the church historian at Central Methodist Baptist Church in downtown Detroit, where King spoke often.
"My mother would have purchased that and she also purchased a companion one that was of his speech in Washington D.C.," Bull said.
"This is in such pristine condition considering that this has been around so long, how'd your mother keep this?" I asked.
"Just in our regular, stereo underneath there was a place where you could store albums and that's where it's been all these years," he said.
Bull's mom and family were all members of the church and understood King's mission.
"I just remember she was just very impressed with him and I guess we were all followers of his, I guess you could say," Bull said.
It's estimated King spoke at Central Methodist eight times, all recorded and archived on reel to reel, but a devastating flood here at the church nearly ruined it all. They're hoping a company in California that transcribed their reels may still have copies.
"Dr. King was offered the pastorate here when Dr. Crain retired in 1958, he said he was very flattered but respectfully he needed to decline because it wouldn't be fair to the congregation that he would be away so much," Bull said.
King told them maybe later in his life, but later would never come. Five years after his "I Have A Dream" speech, King was assassinated. Yet, the fight he began for voting rights wages on 60 years later
"We've come a long ways but we haven't come far enough," Bull said.
"This place is holy ground and we've been called protest central here. Sometimes we've been the site of many peace and civil rights rallies here," he added.
Rallies that included people of all races, all ages and all faiths.
"If the walls could talk, there would be lots of stories, and there still are some stories we have recorded from people who have lived through it," he said. "But the walls are pregnant with some amazing events and an amazing commitment to peace and justice."
