Malcolm X_ A Life of Reinvention - Manning Marable [68]
Both Muhammad and Sharrieff may also have worried that Malcolm, still only twenty-nine, might be moving too quickly. One of them initiated the order in early 1954 to Joseph X Gravitt to travel first to Boston, then to the Philadelphia temple, to aid in the reconsolidation of both temples’ Fruit of Islam as their new captain. Joseph’s immediate supervisor, however, was not to be Malcolm, but Sharrieff.
Joseph’s presence in Philadelphia afforded Malcolm the rare luxury of having occasional mornings and afternoons off, and whenever he could he explored sites such as the city’s art museum and libraries. Most of his time, however, was taken up by his administrative duties throughout the Northeast, which kept him constantly in transit. His absence required Joseph to speak frequently at Philadelphia’s Temple No. 12. The subject of one May 1954 speech was “the duty of Muslims to take the heads of four devils for which they will win a free trip to Mecca.” He explained that this meant “the bringing of a lost Muslim into the Nation of Islam and thereby cutting off a devil’s head.” Such hell-and-damnation rhetoric lacked even the sophistication of the young Malcolm, but in an organization that lived by disclipline such a no-nonsense manner had its advantages.
Side by side, both living in Philadelphia (Malcolm in a rented flat at 1522 North Twenty-sixth Street), the two men seemed an unlikely duo, but over these months they formed bonds of trust and codependence. Malcolm was six feet, three inches tall and weighed no more than 170 pounds; he was youthful, passionate, constantly in motion, intent on honing his language. Joseph, at five feet, six inches, possessed a muscular build, and was small but very tough at 145 pounds; he was quiet and cautious, yet volatile. As in Boston, much of the credit for getting the Philadelphia temple in order went to Malcolm, and indeed in June, in recognition of his outstanding efforts, Muhammad named him the new minister of Harlem’s Temple No. 7. Yet during the two and a half months after Joseph’s arrival in Philadelphia, Malcolm had participated in only four local meetings: Joseph had absolutely been in charge, both as head of the Fruit of Islam and as substitute minister. In the Autobiography, Malcolm is silent about Joseph’s contributions.
In less than a year, Malcolm had gone from line worker at Gar Wood to full minister of the Nation of Islam in one of the most important black centers in the United States. He was keenly aware of the challenge ahead of him. He would later recall, “Nowhere in America was such a single temple potential available as in New York’s five boroughs. They contained over a million black people.”
Sometime in June 1954, Malcolm relocated to New York City. For another three months he continued to serve as the principal minister in both Harlem and Philadelphia, but he devoted most of his time trying to make sense of the situation in New York. His first step was to appoint a man named James 7X as his assistant minister, but not until August was Joseph X transferred to New York, to join him at Temple No. 7 as its FOI captain.
Malcolm found himself with a membership that numbered only a few dozen people. Even that figure is an informed guess: neither he nor any other NOI minister ever revealed publicly the actual numbers, in part because they were so low. From 1952 to early 1953, there were probably fewer than one thousand members throughout the country.
Malcolm found to his dismay that Harlem’s Temple No. 7 was even more disorganized than Philadelphia. For six months he labored to reproduce the growth he had created in Boston and Philadelphia, but without success. The Autobiography offers several explanations. First, Harlem was still filled with ex-Garveyites and a variety of aggressive nationalist groups