1976_05 The Daily Collegian May 1976

              2-THE DAILY COLLEGIAN
1
2 Bulldogs will play pro,
Young and Lane drafted
are far from being over
both were drafted by Hie
pros last month.
Young and Lane were the only
two Bulldogs drafted. Young will
be     playing    for    the   Oakland
will be In a San Diego Charger's
Modern legend:  life of Malcolm X.
THE DAILY COLLEGIAN-3
Wednesday, May 5, 1976
hoping  to  offer an alternative
Malcolm X was born Malcolm
ittle  In Omaha,  Nebraska, on
1925,   the son of Rev.
irl Little, ablack-sklnnedBap-
preacher frdm rural Georgia,
Louise Little,alight-skinned
Its  rather was a
Malcolm himself
height of six foot three.
■other he got his light
he white man feel his
cullt," Malcolm would say.'When
he looks at this mariny face of
mine, he knows what he did to
my grandmother.*
s father was devoted
Garvey, the first or
s  great  black natlqnal-
was known, as Malcolm
a   'crazy nigger.' Be-
hls rerusal to bow down,
driven  out  or Omaha,
mrned In Lansing,
was beaten almost to death and
then thrown under a trolley which
re or poverty and
inger. His mother wound up In
mental hospital, the other chll-
id Malcolm In detention In Main. Michigan, awaiting transfer
ool.
did not actually go to re-
ichool. He charmed the lady
letllnghlm
>1 In Mason
he   made   straight   A's,
the debating club and was
president of the
only the police hut
d two black friends. They
•aught in a robbery' and put
rial. Malcolm believed he got
uch stlffer sentence than he
rwlse would have because of
minister In Boston and Philadelphia. The devotion between Elijah
Muhammad and his disciple was
total. It quickly became a rather-
son relationship, fa 1957, he
sought the Messenger's blessing
on his marriage to "Betty, and
they named the-third ot their six
daughters llyasah, Arabic for
Elijah.
Malcolm thrived and grew in
the world of the Nation. He helped
organize the newspapers, conducted study groups and rose to
1 prom I no nr
"The judge lold me to my
This will teach you to stay
from white girls'."
rved  six
In three
•husetts penitentiaries.
I son he began cold-blood-
•rehabilitate' himself. At
lis   studies   had   no  real
purpose  except  to
ke It In the world.
they    took    on   profound
ig. Malcolm Little's con-
1   to  the   Black  Muslims
istajitaneous  and  binding,
rmed his life almost
lately.  It  came from his
brother. Reginald,
1  told   Malcolm   that  he  had
in the authority of the Honor-
rned  It   rrom Allah Hlmseir,
white people are the devil.
'   It
convert Mai-
He copied out the dlctlon-
ord  for  word  on  writing
.   He  read lncessently at
t until he damaged his eyes,
ming them  to study by the
light rrom the prison cor-
rs.   Eventually   Elijah Mu-
"       '" IMalcolm
Elton. Dylan. Santana.
Rock 96 FM Sterea
Malcolm   came  out or
he went directly
nto the Nation oflslam. Malcolm
onflrmed   his   commitment by
handonlng his "slave name"Llt-
le and receiving the "X," which,
« he explained, announced what
what he had
become,  «Ex-smoker. Ex-
ike r,   Ex-Chrlstlan.   Ex-
1: the 0
who believed all ■
-Satan; the other a dec
ted religious leader
and human.
With his growing
faith began to be trout
was a world for Mateo
most  or his  yeai
In Mr. Mu-
and comfrotable Inside It,"Peter
Goldman says. "But the larger
world outside discovered him,
and he was drawn to It — to Its
complexity. Its sophistication, Its
very   worldllness.'  He became
nent  people of hi;
Sutton.   Ossie   Dai
Dee, John Killens, Dick Gregory,
Kenneth Clark, James Farmer,
Sidney Poltier and Adam Clayton
With conflicts arising from his
contacts with the world and from
within the Nation, Malcolm began
to doubt. He also was aware that
there were, In the world, white
Muslims. How to reconcile this
fact with the Black Muslim doctrine In America that all whites
were devils?
The occasion for Malcolm's
silencing came when, after a lecture, he was asked about the
assassination of President John
F. Kennedy. He called the President's death a case of "chickens
His statement was noised
around the world and made to
sound almost Inhumanly callous.
Malcolm explained that he had
simply meant the President's
death was the Inevitable consequence of a climate of hate and
violence in America, the same
thing many whites had said.
He was reproved by the
Messenger Immediately on the
grounds that his statement was
-no matter what his lntentlons-
in 'bad taste'." The Messenger
ordered Malcolm to goon running
the mosque, but to be silent for
90 days _ to make no talks.
His ofr-the-curr statement not
only discredited him Inthepublic
eye: It provided his enemies
within the Nation with the means
or rutnlnc him.
"He sensed that he would be
cast bark Into the world, which
was to say the grave: he saw that
e had set himself up for It. He
shot.  He shed tears," Charles
Kenyatta related. "He cried."
Although Malcolm detached
himself fronvVbe Nation of the
Lost-Founds, or was thrown out,
his religious convictions remained profound. He drifted, with
his religious faith, toward "true
slam." Some orthodox Muslims
In America suggested he get In
Dr.
Youssef Shawarbe,
learned In Islam at the time directing the Islamic Center of
New York.
Dr. Shawarbe liked- Malcolm
Immediately. "He was a thorough
gentleman, full or glamor and
humor," Shawarbe said, describing Malcolm. But the doctor was
affronted by Malcolm's 'cultlsh
visions of God and the devil." He
told Malcolm that Islam was a
religion of peace and love, and
he read Malcolm this verse from
the Qur'an: "MusUms are all
brothers   regardless* of   their
After weeks of tutoring, Dr.
Shawarbe made arrangements
with the Saudi Arabian government for Malcolm to make the
orthodox Mulslm 's obligatory pilgrimage as Malcolm X. He returned El-HaJJ Malik El-Shabazz,
an accredited Sunnl Muslim.
Malcolm returned to America
in May and tried to explain his
new views to his old following,
not go the Black Muslim way, or
who could not go the Martin
Luther King way. But he returned
to trouble, to renewed threats on
his life and to battle with the
Black Muslims, who considered
him an unforgivable heretic and
Now, added to his fear of assassination in the U.S. was his
certainty that he was being pursued by the U.S. government because of his attempts to girt the
U.D. condemned before the United
Nations. While In Africa he became violently ill one night after
dinner at the Nile Hilton and was
hospitalized. Malcolm suspected
be had been poisoned and that
American agents had done it-
Author peter Goldman finds no
evidence for Malcolm's suspicions. The U.S. government was
not very interested in Malcolm's
trip until later, when In fact It
did put Malcolm under survell-
But the same relentless spirit
that always impeUed Malcolm to
the front lines drove him back
home to Harlem to battle and to
death. Malcolm was like a flitting
moth drawn to flames, almost
consciously knowing in his heart
that bis murder was Inevitably In
the cards.
Now, more than a decade later,
he Is gone, but his name, his
words, his memory are Indelibly
Inscribed and enshrined in black
history  for this generation and
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