1001 People Who Made America - Alan Axelrod [71]
King, Rodney (1965– ) On the night of March 3, 1991, the California Highway Patrol and Los Angeles police officers chased King—who was speeding—for eight miles before he stopped. A confrontation occurred, during which King resisted, and LAPD officers repeatedly beat King with batons. This incident (but not the resistance that had allegedly preceded it) was videotaped by a bystander, and was nationally televised on news programs. It sparked a public outcry against racist-motivated police brutality and sparked massive race riots in Los Angeles in 1992 after a jury acquitted officers on criminal charges.
Kino, Eusebio (1645–1711) This Italian-born Jesuit priest came to America as a missionary and explorer in the Spanish service and established numerous missions in the region known as Pimería Alta, which is now Sonora, Mexico, and Arizona. In contrast to many other missionaries, he opposed the Spanish enslavement of the Indians. He also aided the Pima in diversifying their agriculture.
Kirstein, Lincoln (1907–1996) Kirstein was an impresario, critic, and businessman who promoted dance by working with the famed choreographer George Balanchine to create and direct the ballet companies that were consolidated into the New York City Ballet. Committed to perpetuating American dance, Kirstein was a founder of the School of American Ballet, which he directed from 1940 to 1989.
Kissinger, Henry (1923– ) No appointed official has had a more profound effect on American diplomacy than Henry A. Kissinger. Born in Germany, he fled Nazi persecution with his Jewish family in 1938 and settled in New York. Educated as a political scientist he rose through academia to become adviser for national security affairs and then secretary of state in the administrations of Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford during 1969–1976. Kissinger was a major influence on Nixon’s policy of détente with the Soviet Union and, especially, with China, and was instrumental in formulating Nixon’s Vietnam War policy. It was Kissinger who negotiated peace with North Vietnam’s Le Duc Tho, for which he was awarded—jointly with Tho—the 1973 Nobel Prize for Peace.
Knox, Henry (1750–1806) Knox was a Boston bookstore owner who became active in the independence movement and, during the American Revolution, served as General Washington’s chief artillery commander. Knox was appointed secretary of war in 1785 under the Articles of Confederation and retained this post in the cabinet of President Washington under the newly adopted Constitution in 1789. He served until his retirement from public life in 1795.
Koresh, David (1959–1993) Born Vernon Wayne Howell to a 14-year-old single mother in Houston, Texas, Koresh was expelled from the Seventh-day Adventist Church. He moved to Waco, Texas in 1981, where he joined the Branch Davidians, a religious community of excommunicated Seventh-day Adventists. Proclaiming himself the messiah, Koresh advocated (and practiced) polygamy, and, according to charges by former cult members, perpetrated child abuse. On February 28, 1993, responding to reports that the Branch Davidians had accumulated a stockpile of illegal weapons—and also responding to the accusations of child abuse—agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) raided the Mount Carmel compound. Four ATF agents and six cultists were killed. The FBI moved in and held the compound under siege for 51 days before storming it on April 19, 1993. A fire—subsequently determined to have been started by Koresh and the cultists—consumed the compound, killing 76 people, including Koresh and 27 children. Most Americans regarded Koresh as a deranged cult leader, but some saw the assault as an example of federal tyranny against an American maverick.