evout Muslims were not
allowed to drink alcohol or smoke tobacco. Relationships between men and
women were extremely puritanical. Each temple had special groups to
prepare young men and women for manhood and womanhood. The Fruit of Islam
was the young men's group, and it was a semi-military defense corps aimed
at developing a sense of manhood and the ability for self-defense. The
common belief that the Fruit of Islam was preparing for racial aggression
has never been substantiated. The Muslim Girls' Training Classes taught
cooking, sewing, housekeeping, and etiquette.

After Fard's disappearance, the leadership passed on to Elijah Muhammed,
formerly Elijah Poole, whom Fard had been grooming as his successor.
Elijah Muhammed moved to Chicago and began Temple Number Two and
established his headquarters there. The "Black Muslims", as well as other
small, semi-religious, separatist groups, continued to exist unnoticed by
the general public. When Malcolm Little, better known as Malcolm X, was
converted to the "Nation of Islam", he gave the movement the
organizational skill and the eloquence which it previously lacked. This
brought it into national prominence.

Black Nationalism and the Negro Renaissance shared a strong sense of
racial consciousness and racial pride. However, while the writers who
expressed the spirit of the new Negro still believed in their future in
America, the black nationalists enunciated a mood of alienation and
despair. The Depression, which eroded the hopes of many Americans, hit
the Negro unusually hard. It served to increase the level of bitterness
in the Afro-American community as a whole.

CHAPTER 10

Fighting Racism at Home and Abroad

Hard Times Again

THE new Negro of the 1920s who had struck out for "the Promised Land"
found, in the 1930s, that his old enemies of hunger, cold, and prejudice
were lurking outside the door of his newly chosen home. Hope slid into
despair and cynicism. The dynamic, self-confident Harlem which Johnson
had described in 1925 as the Culture Capital of the Negro World became
choked with disillusionment and frustration, and, in 1935, it was the
scene of looting, burning, and violence.

While the Depression which swept America in 1929 was a national disaster,
it did not hit all segments of society equally, In America, poverty and
starvation are also discriminatory. To quote the old adage again, "The
Negro is the last to be hired and the first to be fi