Death of Echol Cole and Robert Walker
Echol Cole and Robert Walker were two sanitation workers killed in Memphis, Tennessee, on Thursday, February 1, 1968.Background
The deaths of these men, who were crushed to death in a garbage compactor where they were taking shelter from the rain, together with many racial and working-class injustices, prompted Martin Luther King Jr. to join a citywide march on March 18 to honor these men, support the Memphis sanitation strike, and address the human rights violations that led to their deaths. The march ended with police action, but another was scheduled. King was assassinated the evening before the second march.
