Final Parade for an Activist

Civil rights activist Celes King III, who died April 12, was honored Saturday much as he had honored Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

A white horse pulled a carriage that held his casket wrapped in an American flag for two miles along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. That’s the route for the parade held each January in South Los Angeles to honor the slain civil rights leader whom Celes King admired.

The horse-drawn carriage led a procession of nearly 40 cars and limousines, several uniformed Tuskegee Airmen and 10 color guard officers, along with a group of family members and friends who followed on foot. The procession ended at Leimert Park, where politicians, community leaders and family members spoke about King’s legacy, and then later gathered for a funeral at Inglewood Park Cemetery.

“What a way to go, you know? That is honor and respect. That is style,” said Patricia Vining, a community activist who snapped photos of the parade from a street corner. “He’s a man who deserved to be honored like Martin Luther King.”

Celes King, who died April 12 from ailments including gangrene and kidney failure, was instrumental in the 1983 renaming of the boulevard, which used to be called Santa Barbara Avenue. He also helped launch the Kingdom Day Parade, an annual event since 1985.

Although the two men were not related, they shared more in common than a last name.

Celes King “was a superstar in the civil rights movement. He was one of our greatest warriors,” said Najee Ali, a community activist.

The procession began in front of Celes King Bail Bond Services at 1530 W. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., where the inside office is a shrine to his life. The walls are decorated with hundreds of King’s plaques and awards. There is a large black-and-white photo of a young uniformed King as a Tuskegee Airmen pilot sitting in an airplane. A photo of him with Harry Belafonte is mounted on the wall, next to a crayon drawing of heart-shaped smiley faces that reads: “Hi Granddad. Love Dee.”

Outside, police blocked traffic with orange cones and yellow tape. Some mourners wore pressed suits and top hats, sunglasses or African-style dresses. Others carried stylish umbrellas decorated with sequins, beads and flowers to shield them from the sun.

The group lined up and began traveling slowly down the boulevard.

They passed auto shops, fried chicken restaurants, churches, homes and vendors selling Easter baskets on lawns.

Customers from a beauty salon, a 99-cent store and a discount furniture shop came outside to watch. Two women sitting at a bus stop commented on how sad it was that King was gone.

A man stood on his porch and asked a neighbor, “What happened?”

His neighbor, Algene Moore, 53, replied, “The bail bondsman died.” Then he added, “He was a fair man. He got me out of jail.”

Janet Pettiford, 65, stood on a sidewalk near her home and watched, nodding in support.

“I am out here to pay my respects. He worked for this neighborhood,” Pettiford said.

Mollie Bell, a community activist from Compton, said “a horse-drawn carriage? He would have loved this.”

“I’ve only seen it on TV. I saw it when the Rev. Martin Luther King died,” she said. “Now I see it for Celes King.”

Community members said that King, who owned the bail bond service, worked hard to free young men and women he felt were unfairly jailed, including activists.

In addition, he was founder and chairman of the Congress of Racial Equality in California, co-founder of the Brotherhood Crusade in Los Angeles, a former member and president of the Los Angeles Human Relations Commission and head of the Los Angeles Rumor Control and Information Center. He also led the Los Angeles central branch of the NAACP after the 1965 Watts riots.

During World War II, King was an officer with the Tuskegee Airmen, an all-black unit of the Army Air Corps, and he later served as a brigadier general in the California National Guard.

To family members like Dana King, 26, he was “Granddad.”

“He was just that,” she said. “A grand dad. He was grand in everything he did.”