MLK Day: a working holiday?

The news: It's been 21 years since Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday was first celebrated as a national holiday.

Behind the news: For nearly 180,000 people working for some of Chicago's largest employers, Jan. 15 was just another Monday.

The Chicago Reporter contacted the city's 20 largest employers, as compiled by Crain's Chicago Business, to see if workers had the day off in honor of the late civil rights leader. Half remained open--employers like AT&T, JewelOsco and Sears Holdings Corp.

"We never close: Every holiday, somebody's working," said United Airlines spokeswoman Megan McCarthy. The company's corporate office was open, as well.

Sears spokesman Chris Brathwaite said: "We follow the holiday, but our offices are open."

Martha Biondi, an associate professor of African American Studies and History at Northwestern University, criticized businesses like Sears that have marked the holiday with a letter from their executives to employees. "It's an empty gesture that people can see through," she said.

The city's three largest employers--the federal government, Chicago Public Schools and the City of Chicago--were closed. Also closed were Motorola and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. Tom Kelly, a Chase spokesman, said the company's decision was practical and idealistic. "The markets are closed, [and] almost every bank is closed," he said. The bank honored King by having his daughter, Yolanda, talk to workers on Friday, Jan. 12.

"I think that the passage of the holiday legislation was simply the beginning," said Clayborne Carson, director of the Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford University.