I Shared the Dream

From a middle-class African American family, Powers resolved as a child not to follow the pattern set down for her by society. Instead, she ``would make something of myself,'' and that she did. She was almost 40 when she came to politics but quickly made up for lost time, winning a seat in the Kentucky State Senate in 1968 and serving for 21 years, the only black and the only woman in the chamber, eventually becoming chair of the Labor and Industry Committee. She made her mark by pushing a fair housing bill through the legislature, later shepherding the passage of fair employment and antidiscrimination bills as well as a rise in the minimum wage. The survivor of two unsuccessful marriages, she finally married the man who had been her off-and-on lover for years. If the book makes headlines, however, it will not be for any of these reasons but because Powers was the lover of Martin Luther King Jr., who, she says, spent his last night with her. Photos. 30,000 first printing; author tour. (Apr.)