All About Martin Luther King Jr.'s 4 Children: Yolanda, Martin Luther III, Dexter and Bernice

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Martin Luther King Jr.'s children have carried on his legacy.

The civil rights leader and wife Coretta Scott King were parents to four kids: sons Martin Luther King III, 65, and Dexter, 61, and daughters Yolanda and Bernice, 59.

All four of MLK's children were quite young when he was assassinated on April 4, 1968. His eldest, Yolanda was only 12 at the time while his youngest, Bernice, was just 5 years old.

Still, in the over 50 years since his death, each of King's children have worked to honor their parents' accomplishments. "Many were inspired by Dad," Martin told PEOPLE in 2022. "Many were involved in helping to raise money, to get the work done."

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Martin added, "I hope that he would be proud of the fact that our family is still engaged. I'm sure he'd be proud of his granddaughter [Yolanda]. She says, 'I want to continue in my grandfathers' and grandmothers' footsteps, but I want to create my own footsteps.' It's in her DNA."

Here is a look at the lives of Martin Luther King Jr.'s four children, Yolanda, Martin, Dexter and Bernice.

Yolanda Denise King

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MLK and Coretta's first child, daughter Yolanda Denise King, was born on Nov. 17, 1955. She was just 12 years old when her father was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee.

Yolanda later recalled that she was washing dishes in the kitchen when the news broke that her father had died. In January 1999 she told PEOPLE: "I just ran out of the room and screamed, 'I don't want to hear it.' To this day, my heart skips a beat every time I hear one of those special bulletins."

She later found success as an actress, earning roles in several TV and film productions. While Yolanda said that her father found acting "flighty," her mother Coretta signed her up for lessons at the Actors and Writers Workshop in Atlanta, which was the only integrated theater company in the city at the time.

Yolanda attended Smith College and later received a master's degree at New York University in 1979. After some time away from the business, she returned to acting in 1986, taking on characters drawn from and inspired by Black history. Ultimately, she believed her father would have been proud of her. "My father could be bigger than life behind the podium while at home he was this little teddy bear, so gentle and warm," she told PEOPLE. "I know he's very pleased with what I've done."

At 51 years old, Yolanda died on May 15, 2007 — just a year after her mother's death in January 2006.

Martin Luther King III, 65

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MLK and Coretta welcomed their first son, Martin Luther King III, on Oct. 23, 1957. He was only 10 years old when his father was killed.

In 2006, Martin married Arndrea Waters King and two years later, they welcomed their first child together. The couple named their newborn daughter Yolanda Renee King after his late sister.

Martin has spent most of his life honoring his parents' legacy. At times he has acted as a mediator, such as when he met President-elect Donald Trump after he verbally attacked Rep. John Lewis in January 2017. While some were surprised that Martin took the meeting, he explained that he was hoping to diffuse the tension.

"Things get said on both sides in the heat of emotion," Martin said. "At some point, this nation — we've got to move forward. People are literally probably dying. We need to be talking about how do we feed people? How do we clothe people? How do we create the best education system? That's what we need to be focused on."

Two years later, Martin publicly supported Colin Kaepernick after the NFL player had chosen to kneel during the national anthem in protest of racial injustice. Martin suggested that the former member of the San Francisco 49ers, who had allegedly been "blackballed" for his protest, could return to the NFL "overnight" if football fans joined together and demanded it.

"What would change it overnight is if the public decided to say, 'Okay, we're not going to watch.' But it's a complicated situation, because what about the guys who are playing?" Martin said. "That's their jobs, that's their livelihood, they don't need to have to stop playing, but by the same token, I would say the majority of them agree or empathize."

In February 2022, Martin opened up about his late father. "I was very fortunate to be able to travel with Dad maybe seven or eight times," he told PEOPLE. "The most important time, however, was that personal time that we spent with him."

Despite his father's fame and historical significance, Martin said that the civil rights icon was a down-to-earth and hands-on dad who took his kids swimming at the YMCA. Martin recalled that he never felt afraid or worried for his safety when he was out with his dad, no matter where they visited, because of the faith he had in his father's ability to protect him.

Dexter Scott King, 61

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Dexter Scott King was born on Jan. 30, 1961.

Dexter followed in his father's footsteps at Morehouse College in Atlanta, where he studied business. He dropped out for medical reasons in 1983 and later went into music. (He produced an album with Prince and Whitney Houston for the first Martin Luther King Jr. federal holiday in 1986.)

He became a vegetarian in 1987, later telling PEOPLE, "It opened me up in terms of my spiritual self … and enabled me to transcend a lot of emotional interference. Once you can manage your emotions, anything is achievable."

In 1989, Dexter took over operations at the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change, but he stepped down only four months later. In 1993, he was appointed chairman, president and CEO of the organization. Dexter was open about the uphill battle he faced with the center, which had previously been criticized for focusing on optics over action. "I'm being asked to fix something that admittedly is not living up to its full potential or capitalizing on all its resources," he told PEOPLE.

In January 2015, Dexter and his brother Martin sued their younger sister Bernice over several of their father's personal items, including his Bible and his Nobel Peace Prize. The two brothers were in charge of their father's estate and hoped to sell those items, among others, to a private buyer. But this wasn't the only lawsuit the siblings filed against their sister: In August 2013, Dexter sued Bernice in an attempt to stop her from using their father's likeness.

Dexter has also been married to his wife Leah Weber since 2013.

Bernice Albertine King, 59

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MLK's youngest child, Bernice Albertine King, was born on March 28, 1963. She was only 5 years old when the civil rights leader was assassinated.

Bernice later told The Guardian that she was confused after her father's passing. She recalled that recordings of her father were played over speakers at his funeral. "I guess my mother didn't realize that she didn't prepare me, because she told me earlier he wouldn't be able to speak to me, and yet I hear his voice booming out of the speakers and I'm looking around wondering where is he," she said. "I remember that very well."

In 1985, she graduated from Spelman College in Atlanta. She went on to earn a master's degree and a Juris Doctor from Emory University.

At the 50th anniversary commemoration of her father's famed "I Have A Dream" speech, Bernice began the event with her own wise words. "We are here today to call upon our faith, to call upon our spirituality, to call upon our higher selves recognizing that nothing in the world will ever change if it's not for people of faith coming together," she said in her speech.

Years later, Bernice credited her mother as the driving force behind her father's legendary work. "What we know of my father really came from her resilience, her determination, her faith, her courage," she said of her mother Coretta. "She used to say that this family is called. We grew up hearing that a lot."

In May 2020, Bernice called on those protesting following the murder of George Floyd to use nonviolent measures. "As I stand here in this moment and look at my journey, I have to make an appeal to my brothers and sisters, because I realized that the only way to get constructive change is through nonviolent means," she wrote. Bernice later quoted her father, writing, "Riots are the language of the unheard."

Days later, Bernice said that modern-day protesters had the same concerns as her father. "The objectives of those truly protesting are directly connected to issues my father was addressing in the '50s and '60s," she told MSNBC. "The issue is there is still two Americas: the America for Black people and the America for White people."

In June 2020, Bernice told Today that she related to George Floyd's young daughter, who was 6 years old when her father was killed. "I can't stop thinking about what her journey may be like now without her father and having processed through the viciousness of how he was killed and the images," she said. Bernice also said she hoped that the public would remember that, behind images of Floyd's death, there was a child who had lost her father, much like Bernice did at almost the same age.