MARIETTA - Schools and government offices in Cobb will be closed today in observance of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.

However, there are events scheduled to take place in the county to honor the memory of the slain civil rights leader, born and raised in Atlanta. In 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed the bill into law that established the third Monday of January as the Martin Luther King Jr. Day, beginning in 1986.

n In Marietta, the life and legacy of King will be honored today with a ceremony at the Cobb Civic Center in Marietta and a parade through downtown Marietta.

The ceremony begins at 10 a.m. at 548 South Marietta Parkway and is sponsored by the Cobb branch of the NAACP and Cobb County government.

The parade will begin 1 p.m. at Lockheed Credit Union on Fairground Street, from there it will travel to Roswell Street, turn left on Roswell Street and end at Marietta Square. Remarks will follow in Glover Park. NBA hall of famer and ESPY Award-winner Harry Flournoy is the scheduled grand marshal. The parade is sponsored by the Cobb chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

n At Kennesaw State University, actor and author Hill Harper will head a King and Black History Month celebration from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. today in the Bailey Performance Center on campus. The program is sponsored by the KSU African American Student Alliance, in conjunction with the KSU Black History Celebration Committee. Admission is free.

Harper, 43, is a Harvard Law School graduate who currently stars on CBS' "CSI." He is the author of "Letters to a Young Brother," "Letters to a Young Sister," and "The Conversation: How Black Men and Women Can Build Loving, Trusting Relationships," which was published in 2009.

"My goal is to teach, show and prove to everyone that any dream is possible," Harper says in a video on his MANifest Your Destiny Foundation Web site, a nonprofit youth organization designed to inspire young males to be successful. "We're building a community of destiny achievers."