Malcolm X; By any means necessary (Pgs. 1-42)

Summary:
As I read this first part of the book I was immediately hooked by the authors style of writing. In this first part of the book I learned that Malcolm's family comes from a town called Reynolds, Georgia. His father, Earl Little, was a very tall, heavyset, dark man that was skilled with his hands and his mind. His mother, Louise Norton, was an attractive black woman who had come from the British island of Grenada. They met in Montreal, Canada, and in 1919 they married and settled in Philadelphia. The first few years of their marriage were tough because of them being black. This not only affected them but also the majority of the negro population of the United States. When the family moved to Omaha, Nebraska, Earl, brought the ideas of Marcus Garvey. Marcus Garvey was a well educated man that U.N.I.A. , the Universal Negro Improvement Association. On May 19, 1925, a boy named Malcolm was born. The next few years were tough because Malcolm's father led the Omaha chapter of the U.N.I.A. He received several threats from the Klu Klux Klan, until one of those threats put the life of his family in danger, was when they moved from Omaha to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Several years later Malcolm's father was brutally murdered and this cause a lot of pain and heartache to the family. This traumatic event affected Malcolm's life in such a huge way that it transcended with him for the rest of his life.


Quote:
"By the age of thirteen, Malcolm had seen his house burn down. He had been exposed to the violent death of his father, had known extreme hunger, had seen the slow breakdown of his mother, and had also seen brothers and sisters placed in homes" (Dean Myers, 32).


Reaction: 
This quote just made me feel bad and sorry that this young boy had experienced these horrible things. It made me thankful for what I have and what I have experienced in my life.