A Change Is Gonna Come

In 1963, Sam Cooke and his wife were denied a hotel reservation because of their skin color. This incident inspired Cooke to write the song "A Change Is Gonna Come," which became an anthem for the Civil Rights Movement. The song brought unity and hope to African Americans and motivated them to continue fighting for their rights. Despite facing hate and discrimination, Cooke believed that change was inevitable, and eventually, it did come. It's been too hard livin', but I'm afraid to die." Even a task such as getting a hotel reservation in 1963 for a black man, as iconic as Sam Cook, was a procedure that proved most difficult. When Sam Cook and his wife Barbara attempted to get a reservation at the Holiday Inn in Sheppardport, Louisiana, they were denied hospitality as a result of their skin color. Yet, they were not just denied, Sam and Barbara would later be arrested on October 8th, 1963 for disturbing the peace, as they attempted to vehemently present their case of injustice to the hotel caretakers. This instance sparked the groundbreaking record, A Change Is Gonna Come. The song would come to light just four short months after Martin Luther King's iconic I Have a Dream speech. The song became one of the few anthems of the Civil Rights Movement, while not performing strongly among the American populace. But to the Civil Rights Movement, and millions of African Americans, the song conveyed the desperation they all felt. The song encouraged unity and hope among the population, which sparked many different fellow African American musicians to cover it, such as Aretha Franklin and Otis Redding. As a result, the song created a big unity when it was sorely needed. Many African Americans needed that motivation to continue going, and some needed a wake-up call to aid their brothers and sisters in a time of crisis, which it most certainly accomplished. Additionally, the song was able to encapsulate the directness of the movement, but emphasize peace with its use of bowed and brass instruments. Finally, the song embodied the injustice that the African American community faced, considering just a year later, Sam Cooke would attempt to make a reservation at another white-only hotel and be shot dead by the death squirk. Life was never easy for Sam Cooke, and he surely felt all of the hate, divisiveness, and exclusion of the early to mid-1900s. Despite all of this, Sam Cooke knew a change was bound to come, and mercifully, it did.