Born: May 17, 1933, Bronx, NY

Education: Boston English high school, honors graduate, Winston-Salem Teachers College, 1951–53

Imam of the Nation of Islam (NOI), Farrakhan is one of the most influential black religious leaders. For blacks to secure “freedom, justice and equality,” he advocates Islam, black nationalism, and self-determination.

Farrakhan became captain of NOI's security force and minister of Temple No. 11 in Boston by the late 1950s. He rose to national spokesman when Malcolm X left NOI (1964) but not to imam after Elijah Muhammad died in 1975. Muhammad's son Warith succeeded him, reinvented NOI as the American Society of Muslims, which embraced orthodoxy and racial inclusion. Leading a large splinter group, Farrakhan reclaimed NOI's name, properties, and teachings.

By 1981 he had reopened 130 mosques and rebuilt membership to tens of thousands. He received wide publicity through NOI's antidrug project, a Time cover story, and television, including Sixty Minutes. But mainstream media attacked him when, as a supporter of Jesse Jackson's 1984 presidential campaign, he made anti-Semitic statements. Still, the NAACP invited him to its Black Leadership Summit; he remained outspoken on race, religion, and politics. He also co-organized the Million Man March for atonement and responsibility (1995), then the largest black demonstration in American history.