Opinion: Mary Almanza Key Figure in Black Muslim History

March 31, 2005

Source: Detroit Free Press

http://www.freep.com/news/metro/cooper31e_20050331.htm

On March 31, 2005 the Detroit Free Press reported, "On April 17, 1934, a squad of Detroit police officers converged upon a school at 3408 Hastings. They approached carefully, even cutting the building's telephone wires. Once inside, Mary Almanza and 12 other teachers were booked for contributing to the delinquency of minors and subversion. The name of the school was the University of Islam, established by Detroit's newly formed Nation of Islam. Almanza, one of its founding members, died in February at the age of 109, having lived to see her faith grow from a marginalized anomaly to one of the most influential movements in African-American history."