# The Straight Dope on Wallace Fard **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 24, 2015, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516 "2015-02-24T14:52:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/1 "2015-02-24T14:52:42Z")
Founder of the Nation of Islam. I was intrigued by his [Wiki entry](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallace_Fard_Muhammad) - I don’t know of anyone else in such recent times who had such a major impact on the world and about whom so little is known. Appeared out of nowhere with his original identity unknown, founds a very successful religion, and then mysteriously disappears. Basically my question is whether there has been any other research that has succeeded in shedding more definitive light on his true identity and ultimate fate after his disappearance than is shown in this Wiki entry. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/2 "2015-02-24T14:57:07Z")
No answer to your question, but “major impact on the world?” “Very successful religion?” The Wikipedia article suggests that the Nation of Islam has maybe 50,000 members. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/3 "2015-02-24T15:05:41Z")
The article suggests that 50,000 may be an understatement if you count all followers (versus members). And a lot of people have split off over the years in favor of a more orthodox Islamic religion. But even 50,000 is a lot of people for a new religion started in about 1930. ---
**Author:** ![dolphinboy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dolphinboy/32/330_2.png) [@dolphinboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dolphinboy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/4 "2015-02-24T15:14:03Z")
Back in 1930 people could live pretty anonymously if they never had a run in with the law, didn’t drive a car or go into the armed services. Especially if they lived in a big city or in a very rural part of the country. Someone could drop out of school, leave home and disappear into the landscape without leaving much of a trail. So I don’t think it’s that surprising given the time frame. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/5 "2015-02-24T15:40:18Z")
Jeffrey Eugenides in _Middlesex_ postulated that he was a Greek immigrant who posed as an Arab and started a religion to conceal his identity after faking his death as a rum-runner during Prohibition. The real Fard seems to have been of Maori origins. His ability to successfully conceal his identity and to disappear as mysteriously as he appeared is to be understood in the context of America’s racial segregation where whole movements could sweep the African-American communities without white authorities and official record-keepers even noticing. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/6 "2015-02-24T15:47:59Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > … > > The real Fard seems to have been of Maori origins. His ability to successfully conceal his identity and to disappear as mysteriously as he appeared is to be understood in the context of America’s racial segregation where whole movements could sweep the African-American communities without white authorities and official record-keepers even noticing. I looked up a portrait of him and it seems that he could be plausibly of Pacific Island origin. If so, could he in fact have been Malay? That could explain his familiarity with and affinity for aspects of Islam, as the Malay peninsula has had a strong Muslim presence for hundreds of years. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/7 "2015-02-24T16:06:56Z")
It’s very likely that Fard was originally a member of the Moorish Science religion. When he later started his own Nation of Islam religion, he didn’t want people saying that it was just an offshoot of Moorish Science. So Fard and NOI members always denied that Fard had ever been involved in Moorish Science. This explains the apparent gap in Fard’s past - he didn’t want to admit he’d spent those years in Moorish Science. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/8 "2015-02-24T16:23:20Z")
Not just very likely, it’s a [documented fact](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallace_Fard_Muhammad#Moorish_Science_Temple_of_America) that Fard got his start with Moorish Science. Among others, his self-identification as of Spanish race from Oregon is patently phony. Afghanistan, New Zealand, Spanish, Arab??? Will the real impostor please sit down? Maori and Malay are related in both being Austronesian and each having 5 letters starting with Ma-. Otherwise, they are not really similar. There was also speculation about Fard being part Afghan—any evidence, though? Some people guessed Fard must have had a Persian sort of background because he coined the name _Shabazz_, which superficially resembles the Persian name Shahbāz. But I’ve seen a linguistic analysis that makes a strong case for it being of Arabic derivation and more in line with NOI doctrine. In Arabic, شعب عزّ _sha‘b ‘azz_ means ‘a people that is mighty and glorious’. When people casually omit the ‘ mark transliterating the Arabic letter ‘ayn, you get the spelling “Shabazz.” ---
**Author:** ![Steken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Steken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steken)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/9 "2015-02-24T17:41:00Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Not just very likely, it’s a [documented fact](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallace_Fard_Muhammad#Moorish_Science_Temple_of_America) that Fard got his start with Moorish Science. Yep. From Elizabeth Pérez’s _Working Roots and Conjuring Traditions: Relocating Black ‘Cults and Sects’ in African-American Religious History_, published in _Esotericism in African American Religious Experience_: > [@](#): > > One of Noble Drew Ali’s disciples was Wallace Dodd Ford, renamed Ford-El, to whom he entrusted the Chicago Temple before his death. Ford-El later relocated to Detroit, began to go by the names Wallace D. Fard and Wallace D. Fard Muhammad, and organized the Nation of Islam. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2015, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-straight-dope-on-wallace-fard/713516/10 "2015-02-24T18:20:17Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Not just very likely, it’s a [documented fact](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallace_Fard_Muhammad#Moorish_Science_Temple_of_America) that Fard got his start with Moorish Science. I’m sticking with very likely. I don’t think it’s indisputable. The earliest reports that Fard was a Moorish Science member seem to have been made in 1945 and these claims seem to be based on third or fourth hand accounts.