The murders of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy in 1968 nearly killed John Lewis. The men were models for the young man from Troy, Ala., now in his 12th term in the U.S. House of Representatives. Lewis plans to serve as long as voters in Georgia’s 5th district will allow. Retirement, he said, “is not in my DNA.”

It’s been 50 years now, but there are times when Charles Person still finds it hard to talk about the summer of 1961 without his voice breaking. The 68-year-old Atlanta man recalls the unfathomable hatred. The beatings. The constant reminders that blacks should stay in their place.

That summer, Person was a pioneer in what would come to be known as the Freedom Rides, an organized effort initiated by the Congress of Racial Equality to challenge the South’s segregation of passengers on interstate travel.

Nearly every seat was filled as thousands were on hand Sunday at Cobo Center to hear the Detroit Branch NAACP's keynote speaker John Lewis, a civil rights pioneer and U.S. representative from Georgia, and honoree Detroit musician Kid Rock.

Lewis urged African Americans to keep up the fight for equality. "We have a lot of work to do in our neighborhoods and our community," he said. "We must end the violence.  We must stop the killing.  We must get out there and tell kids to pull up their pants and walk with pride and dignity."