PARADES, PRAYER TO EXTOL KING\Special events mark holiday.

Byline: Jeannette DeSantis Daily News Staff Writer

On what would have been his 67th birthday, millions of people across Southern California will celebrate the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. today at special events observing the national holiday established in his honor.

King Day, honoring the civil rights leader who used nonviolent means to bring about social change, will be marked with special gatherings, parades and religious services throughout the Los Angeles area.

King led the civil rights movement in the United States from the 1950s until his assassination in April 1968.

Events leading up to today's holiday have been held for the past week, including a gospel music concert in the San Fernando Valley on Sunday at the First Presbyterian Church of North Hollywood.

The North Hollywood congregation was joined by the choir from a South Central Los Angeles parish of St. Mark Missionary Baptist Church.

Following are some of the events scheduled for today:

At 8 a.m. the Archdiocese of Los Angeles will celebrate King's legacy with a prayer breakfast.

Bishop Joseph Francis of Newark, N.J., will deliver the keynote address, "Nonviolent Social Change Reducing Racial Tension," at Verbum Dei High School, 11100 S. Central Ave.

At 8:30 a.m. the city of Inglewood will sponsor the 13th annual symbolic march to celebrate King's birthday. Former Los Angeles Laker Michael Cooper will be the grand marshal. The march will begin at Gate 8 on the north side of the Hollywood Park racetrack, 90th Street and Prairie Avenue, and proceed east on 90th Street to Crenshaw Boulevard. Then participants will march south to the First Church of God, 9550 S. Crenshaw Blvd. After 10 a.m., Inglewood Unified School District Superintendent McKinley Nash will speak and the First AME Church choir will perform.

At 11 a.m. the annual Kingdom Day Parade will be held, featuring a number of television personalities, marching bands and floats.

The three-mile parade will begin at the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza, Crenshaw and Martin Luther King boulevards, and end at the Los Angeles Coliseum, Menlo Avenue and 39th Street.

At 6:30 p.m. poet Maya Angelou is scheduled to deliver the keynote address at the Southern Christian Leadership Conference's Martin Luther King Birthday Dinner Celebration at the Westin Bonaventure, 404 S. Figueroa St.

At 7 p.m. the San Fernando Valley Interfaith Council will present its eighth annual Interfaith Valley Martin Luther King Celebration Service, "Don't Let the Light Go Out - Nonviolent Social Change: Reducing Racial Tension." The service will be at St. Stephen's Lutheran Church, 15950 Chatsworth Blvd.

The memorial will feature a performance by a choir under the direction of the Rev. Andrae Crouch. The council, formed in 1964, represents 275 congregations of Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and members of other faiths. The Rev. Barry Smedberg, the council's executive director, said the holiday is a time for all races and religions to gather in King's memory.

In a post-holiday observance, civil-rights leader Joe Hicks, former executive director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference of Greater Los Angeles, is scheduled to speak at an event sponsored by the Burbank Human Relations Council.

Hicks will speak at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the First United Methodist Church, 700 N. Glenoaks Blvd. During the program, recognition will be given to civic groups and individuals who have fostered positive human relations.

Most government offices and schools are closed today in observance of the national Martin Luther King holiday.

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