“Bigger Than Montgomery” 169    he recovered at the home of pastor and family friend Sandy Ray in Brook- lyn. When he finally returned to Montgomery over a month later, he was greeted warmly by a large crowd at the airport. In his remarks to those gathered, King announced: “I have come back, not only because this is my home, not only because my family is here, not only because you are my friends whom I love. I have come back to rejoin the ranks of you who are working ceaselessly for the realization of the ideal of Freedom and Justice for all men.” Reflecting on the outpouring of goodwill he had received after the stabbing, King surmised that “this affection was not for me alone. Indeed it was far too much for any one man to deserve. It was really for you. It was an expression of the fact that the Montgomery Story had moved the hearts of men everywhere. Through me, the many thousands of people who wrote of their admiration, were really writing of 39 their love for you.” The stir caused by Stride toward Freedom in Montgomery was not all related to King’s subsequent stabbing. According to Dexter mem- ber Thelma Rice, tempers flew when the book came out: “Some people felt they were left out of the publication and their contributions to the struggle diminished or overlooked.” Others believed the book failed to properly credit the labors that took place in Montgomery before King’s arrival on the scene. Many of the fractures in the town’s African American community that Trezzvant Anderson highlighted in his Pittsburgh Couri- er articles were further exacerbated by the appearance of King’s book.40 The stabbing forced King to delay his annual report to Dexter by several weeks. When he finally submitted his chronicle of the previous ministry year, he thanked his congregation for their ongoing support and encouragement. Calling the year “rather difficult” personally, he noted that he faced “the brutality of police officers, an unwarranted arrest, and a near fatal stab wound” that had affected him greatly. Dexter remained supportive through “thoughtful, considerate gestures of goodwill” that helped provide King “the courage and strength to face the ordeals of that 41 trying period.” The dawn of 1959 provided King with additional opportunities on both the national and international stage. In late January, a group of seventy- five Alabama African American leaders convened at Abernathy’s First Baptist Church to respond to the consistent roadblocks preventing many