How will today’s generation—young men and women who grew up long after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. lived and died—come to appreciate the struggles and sacrifices made by the great civil rights leader?

That was the question posed by the guest speaker at Monday afternoon’s King Day service at Gloucester’s the First United Baptist Church, an event sponsored by the Gloucester Union Relief Association.

The Rev. Dr. Debra Haggins, the program’s guest speaker and the first woman to hold the position of chaplain in the 144-year history of Hampton University, spoke on “The Choice of a New Generation.”

“How will the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. be passed on?” she asked. “How will they know unless we tell them?”

She went on to describe a long list of “What ifs” in King’s life, from his birth through being called to the pastorate of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, the Montgomery bus boycott, the ...