Primary Sources: The 1960s: Nation of Islam

"Ethel Minor offers her perspective on the black freedom struggle in this 1997 interview with Catherine Osborn. A follower of Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam, Minor found the integrationist aims of Martin Luther King, Jr. and his followers "humiliating." She preferred the more militant approach of Malcolm X, whom she describes as "a truth-bearing angel from heaven.""

"These are three monographs (each roughly 100 pages) produced by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)'s Central Research Section about the Nation of Islam (NOI) for the use of FBI agents. They are:
"Muslim Cult of Islam" (6/28/1955)
"The Nation of Islam (Antiwhite, All-Negro Cult in the United States)" (10/1960)
"Nation of Islam: Cult of the Black Muslims" (5/1965)"

Documentary from PBS with Mike Wallace "exploring the black muslim and anti-black muslim movments of the time."

"...radio broadcast by Muhammad was aired in the NYC area on radio station WNTA on November 23, 1960. It was part of a series of radio broadcasts by the NOI that -- in part -- sought to explain the group's separatist and nationalist racial philosophy to the public. "
University of Albany Talking History website.

"Malcolm X was a civil rights leader, a spokesperson for the Nation of Islam, and a leading black nationalist during the early 1960’s. Viewing integration as an illusory solution to the problems of black Americans, Malcolm X advocated self-reliance, black pride, and unity. Malcolm’s message became popular among Northern blacks as the Civil Rights movement failed to alleviate problems such as poverty, joblessness, police brutality, and de facto segregation. Although many Northern whites felt uncomfortable confronting racial inequities close to home, conditions for African Americans living in Northern and Western cities rivaled those of the South. In 1962 the Los Angeles Police Department, notorious in the Watts section of L.A. for harassing and brutalizing black youth, targeted the Nation of Islam in an act of violence. Malcolm X spoke out about the incident on WBAI radio."