The Best of Louis Farrakhan

An influential and often controversial Black religious leader, Louis Farrakhan has since 1978 been the leader of the Nation of Islam, an African American movement that combines elements of Islam with Black nationalism.

Early life

Born Louis Eugene Walcott on May 11, 1933, in the Bronx, New York, he was raised in Boston by his mother, Sarah Mae Manning, an immigrant from St. Kitts and Nevis. His biological father was Jamaican-born Percival Clark. However, he was named after a man with whom his mother was involved after a separation from Clark.

Deeply religious as a boy, the young Louis Walcott became active in the St. Cyprian’s Episcopal Church in his Roxbury neighborhood, where he was influenced by the resident priest, Black liberation writer Nathan Wright. He graduated with honors from the prestigious Boston English High School, where he played the violin and was a member of the track team.

Walcott attended the Winston-Salem Teachers College (now Winston-Salem State University) in North Carolina from 1951 to 1953 but dropped out to pursue a career in music. Known as “The Charmer,” he performed professionally on the Boston nightclub circuit as a singer of calypso and country songs. In 1953 Farrakhan married his high-school sweetheart, Khadijah (née Betsy Ross), with whom he had nine children.