Elijah Muhammad

Elijah Muhammad (1897 1975) was the leader of the Nation of Islam ("Black Muslims") during their period of greatest growth in the mid 20th century. He was a major advocate of independent, black operated businesses, institutions, and religion. [ in bahasa ]

Elijah Muhammad was born Elijah (or Robert) Poole on October 7, 1897, near Sandersville, Georgia. His parents worked as sharecroppers on a cotton plantation; his father was also a Baptist preacher. As a youngster Elijah worked in the fields and on the railroad, but he left home at age 16 to travel and work at odd jobs. He settled in Detroit in 1923, working on a Chevrolet assembly line.

Poole and his two brothers became early disciples of W.D. Fard, the founder of the Nation of Islam. Fard, of mysterious background, appeared in Detroit in 1930, selling silk goods and telling his customers in Detroit is African American ghetto of their ancestral "homeland" across the seas. Soon Fard began holding meetings in homes, and then in rented halls, telling his listeners tales purporting to describe their nonwhite kin in other lands and urging them to emulate these brothers and sisters in such matters as dress and diet. Fard proclaimed Islam the one correct religion for African Americans, denouncing Christianity as the religion of the slavemasters. His meetings became dominated by his bitter denunciations of the white race. Soon Fard announced the opening of the Temple of Islam. It featured much antiwhite invective and embodied an unorthodox form of Islam, but the movement also emphasized African American self help and education.

Fard disappeared, as mysteriously as he had arrived, in the summer of 1934. The movement he had founded quickly developed several factions, the most important of which was led by Poole, who had become a top lieutenant to Fard and whose name along the way had been changed to Elijah Muhammad. The movement had long had a policy of requiring members to drop their "slave" names.

Settling in Chicago, away from hostile Muslim factions in Detroit, Muhammad built what quickly became the most important center of the movement. Chicago soon featured not only a Temple of Islam, but a newspaper called Muhammad Speaks, a University of Islam (actually a private elementary and high school), and several movement owned apartment houses, grocery stores, and restaurants. Temples were opened in other cities, and farms were purchased so that ritually pure food could be made available to members. The movement was a sharply disciplined one. Members had strict rules to follow regarding eating (various foods, Such as pork, were forbidden), smoking and drinking (both banned), dress and appearance (conservative, neat clothing and good grooming were required), and all kinds of personal behavior (drugs, the use of profanity, gambling, listening to music, and dancing were all outlawed).

Muhammad also revised the theology of the movement. Under his system, Fard was proclaimed the earthly incarnation of Allah, the Muslim name for God; (Elijah) Muhammad was his divinely appointed prophet. Muhammad also taught that blacks constituted the origin beings, but that a mad black scientist named Yakub had created a white beast through genetic manipulation and that whites had been given a temporary dispensation to govern the worId that period. That period, however, was due to end soon; now the tirne was at hand for blacks to resume their former dominant role. It was understood that violent war would be likely before the transition could be completed. In the meantime, Muhammad advocated an independent nation for African Americans.

In 1942 Muhammad was one of a group of militant African American leaders arrested on charges of sedition, conspiracy, and violation of the draft laws. He was accused of sympathizing with the Japanese during World War II and of encouraging his members to resist the military draft. He had, indeed, argued that all nonwhites are oppressed by whites, and that it made no sense for African Americans to fight those who were victims of white racism as much as they themselves were. Muhammad was certainly no pacifist, but he argued that the only war in which African Americans should participate would be the coming “Battle of Armageddon," in which blacks would reassert their rightful superiority. For his words and actions Muhammad spent four years, from 1942 to 1946, in federal prison at Milan, Michigan.

Factions occasionally withdrew from Muhammad's movement. In the early 1960s Muhammad came to be overshadowed by the charismatic Malcolm X, leader of the New York Temple. Tensions between Malcolm X and Muhammad’s leadership grew; finally, after Malcolm X commented that John F. Kennedy's assassination was a case of "the chickens coming home to roost," Muhammad suspended him. Shortly thereafter, in 1964, Malcolm X founded his own movement, which moved toward a more orthodox form of Islam. However, Malcolm X was assassinated on February 21, 1965.

Elijah Muhammad died on February 25, 1975. After his death the leadership of his movement passed to his son, Wallace (now Warith) Deen Muhammad. The younger Muhammad renamed the movement the World Community of Al-Islam in the West, and then the American Muslim Mission; he also began to call blacks "Bilalians," after Bilal, to have been an African follower of the Prophet Muhammad. Warith Muhammad relaxed the strict dress code, abandoned resistance to military service, encouraged members to vote and to salute the flag, and even opened the movement to whites. In general, he made the movement much more conventionally Islamic.

Many members were disturbed at the movement's new, moderate direction and withdrew to form more traditionalist splinter groups. The most important of them retained the old name, the Nation of Islam, and was led by Louis Farrakhan (born Louis Eugene Walcott of British West Indian Parents in 1934). Farrakhan generally retained Elijah Muhammad’s ideas and practices, including the strict behavioral rules. He achieved prominence when he became a major adviser to Jesse Jackson during the latter's presidential campaign in 1984. At that time Farrakhan aroused controversy, particularly for his reported death threats directed at Jackson’s Jewish critics.

Philip

Philip (died 1676), Native American chief, led his Wampanoag tribe and their allies in a losing fight against the encroachments of New England colonists. [ in bahasa ]

Philip was born probably at the tribal village of the Wampanoag Indians at Mount Hope, R.I. His father, Massassoit, sachem (chief) of the tribe, took his two Sons to the Plymouth settlement and asked that they be given English names; the elder son was renamed Alexander, and the other was called Philip.

Alexander became sachem of the Wampanoag upon the father’s death. In 1661, however, Alexander was arrested by the Plymouth Bay colonists; on the way to Plymouth he sickened and died suddenly, causing the Native American to believe that he had been poisoned. The next year Philip became sachem.

As sachem, Philip renewed his father's treaty with the colonists and lived peacefully with them for 9 years. But gradually Philip became hostile to the whites because their increasing numbers resulted in scarcity of game, failure of the Native Americans' fisheries, and encroachment on Native American lands. Purchasing English goods or guns with land, the Native Americans were gradually being forced into marginal swamplands.

Philip's arrogance contributed to the growing tensions. He declared himself the equal of his "brother," Charles II. He also began plotting against the settlers. In 1671 he was summoned to Taunton, Mass., and confronted with evidence of his plotting, but he was released after signing a statement of submission, paying a fine, and surrendering part of his tribe's firearms.

The open break between the two races came in 1675. Philip's former secretary, Sassamon, was murdered by the Wampanoag, who believed that Sassamon had betrayed Native American secrets to the settlers. Three Wampanoag braves were executed for this crime. Philip reacted by sending his tribe's women and children to live with the Narragansett Indians and by making an alliance with the Nipmuck. On June 24, 1675, their attack on a colonial village triggered King Philip's War.

The fighting spread to Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay colonies, west to the Connecticut River, and north to Vermont. The Native Americans killed men, women, and children in these raids. The United Colonies of New England sent a combined army to try for a decisive battle, but Philip preferred stealth, ambush, and surprise raids in which, he generally displayed wily and effective leadership. However, he was unsuccessful in persuading the Mohegan and Mohawk Indians to join him.

The colonists tried a new strategy. On Dec. 19, 1675, Governor Josiah Winslow and 1,000 troops attacked the Narragansett village, killed 1,600 Native Americans, and captured the Wampanoag women and children, selling many of them into slavery in the West Indies and South America. They also destroyed Native American crops, offered amnesty to deserters, and advertised a reward for any Native American killed in battle.

Philip saw his army melt away. With a few faithful followers he was pursued from place to place; meanwhile, his wife and son were captured and sold into slavery. in the swamps near Mount Hope he was shot on Aug, 12,1676, by a Native American serving the colonials. Philip's body was beheaded and drawn and quartered, and his head was exhibited at Plymouth for 20 years.

Philip's war saw 12 colonial towns destroyed, thousands of deaths, and colonial debts of f 100,000. His victories were largely the result of colonial inefficiency, but the war was the result of increasing pressure for land from the growing number of British colonists in America.

Norman Rockwell

Norman Percevel Rockwell (1894 1978) is remembered for his heartwarming illustrations of American life that appeared on covers of the Saturday Evening Post magazine for many decades. Marked by nostalgia and moral fortitude, the paintings remain popular with collectors. [ in bahasa ]

When people use the expression "as American as apple pie" they could just as well say as American as a Norman Rockwell painting. Rockwell produced cover paintings for the Saturday Evening Post, a major magazine of its day, for several decades. In the process he became nationally renowned. His nostalgic vision and eye for detail brought him enormous popularity. "He created a moral myth in which people were reassured of their own essential goodness," art critic Arthur C. Danto told Allison Adato of Life magazine. "And that is a very powerful thing." Film director Steven Spielberg remarked to Adato, "Growing up, we always subscribed to the Post. He [Rockwell] saw an America of such pride and self worth. My vision is very similar to his, for the most part because of him."

Summers in the Country
Rockwell was born on February 3, 1894, in New York City. His father worked for a textile firm, starting as office boy and eventually moving up to manager of the New York office. His parents were very religious and the young Rockwell was a choir boy. Until he was about 10 years old the family spent its summers in the country, staying at farrns,that took in boarders. Rockwell recalled in his autobiography MyAdventures as an illustrator, " I have no bad memorics of my summers in the country," and noted that his recollections "all together form[ed] an image of sheer blissfulness." He believed that these rummers "had a lot to do with what I painted later on."

Rockwell enjoyed drawing at an early age and soon decided he wanted to be an artist. During his freshman year in high school, he also attended the Chase School on Saturdays to study art. Later that year he attended Chase twice a week. Halfway through his sophomore year, he quit high school and went full time to art school.

Started at Bottom in Art School
Rockwell enrolled first in the National Academy School and then attended the Art Students League. Because he was so dedicated and solemn when working at his art, he related in his autobiography, he was nicknamed "The Deacon" by the other students. In his first class with a live model, the location of his easel was not the best. The nude young woman was lying on her side and all Rockwell could see was hei'feet and rear end. So that is what he drew. Rockwell noted that, as Donald Walton wrote in his book A Rockwell Portrait, "he started his career in figure drawing from the bottom up."

At the Art Students League, Rockwell I had two teachers who had a significant influence on him: George Bridgeman, a teacher of draftsmanship, and Thomas Fogarty, a teacher Of illustration. Besides their expert instruction, Walton wrote, "they conveyed their enthusiasm about illustration."

While still at the school, Forgaty sent Rockwell to a publisher, where he got a job illustrating a children's book. He next received an assignment from Boys' Life magazine. The editor liked his work and continued to give him illustration assignments. Eventually Rockwell was made art director of the magazine. He regularly illustrated various other children's magazines after that. "I really didn't have much trouble getting started," he remarked in his autobiography, "The kind of work I did seemed to be what the magazine wanted."

Paintings Made the Post
In March of 1916, Rockwell traveled to Philadelphia to attempt to see George Horace Lorimer, editor of the Saturday Evening Post, to show him some proposed cover paintings and sketches. It was his dream to do a Post cover. So he set out to sell Lorimer on his work. Since he did not have an appointment, the art editor came out and looked at his work, then showed it to Lorimer. The editor accepted Rockwell's two finished paintings for covers and also liked his three sketches for future covers. Rockwell had sold every thing; his dream was not just realized but exceeded. This was the start of a long term relationship with the Post.

His success with the Post made Rockwell more attractive to other major magazines and he beg in to sell painting and drawings to Life, Judge, and Leslie’s. Also in 1916 he married Irene O’ Connor, a school teacher.

In 1917, shortly after the United States entered World War 1, Rockwel decided to join the navy. He was assigned to the carnp newspaper, related Walton, and he was able to continue doing his paintings for the Post and other publications. When the war ended in 1918, Rockwell got an Immediate discharge.

Top Cover Artist
After the war, besides magazine works, Rockwell started doing advertising illustration. He did work for jell-O, Willys cars, and Orange Crush soft drinks, among others. Also in 1920, he was requested to paint a picture for the Boy Scout calendar. He would continue to provide a picture for the popular calendar for over 50 years. During the 1920s RockwelI became the Post's top cover artist and his income soared. In 1929 he was divorced from his wife Irene.

In 1930, Rockwell married Mary Barstow. They had three sons over the next several years. In 1939, the family moved to a 60 acre farm in Arlington, Vermont. In 1941, the Milwaukee Art Institute gave Rockwell his first one-man show in a major museum.

Four Freedoms
After President Franklin Roosevelt made his 1941 address to Congress setting out the "four essential human freedoms," Rockwell decided to paint images of freedoms, reported Maynard Good Stoddard of the Saturday Evening Post. With the U.S. entry into World War 2. Rockwell created the four paintings during a six month period in 1942. His “Four Freedoms" series was published in the Post in 1943. The painting portrayed Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, and Freedom from Fear. The pictures became greatly popular and many other publications sent the Post requests to reprint.

Then the federal government took the original painting on a national tour to sell war bonds. As Ben Hibbs, editor of the Post, noted in Rockwell's autobiography, “They were viewed by 1,222,000 people in 16 leading cities and were instrumental in selling $132,992,539 worth of bonds.” Then, in 1943, his studio burned to the ground. Rockwell lost some original paintings, drawings, and his extensive collection of costumes. The family then settled in nearby West Arlington.

Wide Array of Work
Over the years Rockwell did illustrations for an everwidening array of projects. He did commemorative stamps for the Postal Service. He worked on posters for the Treasury Department, the military, and Hollywood movies. He. did mail order catalogs for Sears and greeting cards for Hallmark, and illustrated books including The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

In 1953, Rockwell and family moved to Stockbridge, Massachusetts. In the summer of 1959, his wife Mary suffered a heart attack and died. During the I960s, Rockwell painted portraits of various political figures, including all of the presidential and vice presidential candidates. Most of these were done for Look magazine. In 1961, he was presented with an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Massachusetts. That same year he received an award that he especially treasured, wrote Walton. He was given the Interfaith Award of the National Conference of Christian and Jews for his Post cover paining of the Golden Rule. Also in 1961, Rockwell married a retired schoolteacher by the name of Molly Punderson.

RockwelI's last Post cover appeared in December of 1963. Over the years he had done 317 covers. 'The magazine’s circulation was shrinking at that time and new management decided to switch to a new format. After Rockwell and the Post parted ways, he began a different assignment, painting news pictures for Look. He also started painting for McCall’s.

People choice
In 1969 Rockwell had a one man show ir New York City. Art critics often were less than flattering toward Rockwell’s work; if they did not knock him, they ignored him. But the public loved his paintings and many were purchased for prices averaging around $20,000. Thomas Buechner wrote in Life, "It is difficult for the art world to take the people's choice very seriously." Rockwell himself said to Walton, "I could never be satisfied with just the approval of the critics, and, boy, I've certainly had to be satisfied without it."

In 1975, at the age of 81, Rockwell was still painting, working on his 56th Boys Scout calendar. In 1976 the city of Stockbridge celebrated a Norman Rockwell Day. On November 8, 1978, Rockwell died in his home in Stockbridge.

Buechner noted that Rockwell's art "has been reproduced more often than all of Michelangelo's Rembrandt's and Picasso's put together." In 1993, a new Rockwell museum was opened just outside of Stockbridge. Museum director Laurie Norton Moffatt cataloged his art in a two volume book, wrote Landrum Bolling of the Saturday Evening Post, and listed over 4,000 original works. As Walton wrote, throughout his life, Rockwell followed the motto: "Don't worry; just work."


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references:
Norman Rockwell Museum
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