The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was a living monument to the best of America, speakers around the country said yesterday at Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebrations.

“Parents and grandparents have personal memories of King that they want to share with the next generation,” said Andrew Ackerman at the Children’s Museum of Manhattan, where 2,000 visitors turned out.

At a Harlem rally, the Rev. Al Sharpton said, “Martin Luther King was a controversial figure, even among blacks, [because he] confronted what’s wrong in our country.”

Worshippers at the Atlanta church where King preached heard a similar message from Princeton University professor Cornel West, who urged them not to “sanitize” King’s legacy and put it in “some distant museum” but to remember King’s call to help others.

And in Washington, President Obama and the first family honored King by serving food to the needy at a homeless center near the White House.