The Mantle on the Riverbank

In 1968, thirty-nine-year-old Ralph Abernathy stood on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, cradling Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as his mentor lay dying. Within hours, Abernathy faced a question no one could answer for him: Would he pick up what had fallen? He did. Abernathy led the Poor People's Campaign to Washington that summer, sleeping in the mud of Resurrection City, carrying forward a vision that was never meant to die with one man.…