where he appeared in the Philadelphia Convention Hall on the radio station WCAU program of Ed
Harvey. "You are the man who has said 'All Negroes are angry and I am the angriest of all'; is that
correct?" asked Harvey, on the air, introducing Malcolm X, and as Malcolm X said crisply, "That
quote is correct!" the gathering crowd of bystanders stared at him, riveted.
We had ridden to Philadelphia in reserved parlor car seats. "I can't get caught on a coach, I could
get into trouble on a coach," Malcolm X had said. Walking to board the parlor car, we had passed
a dining car toward which he jerked his head, "I used to work on that thing." Riding to our
destination, he conversationally told me that the F.B.I. had tried to bribe him for information about
Elijah Muhammad; that he wanted me to be sure and read a new book, Crisis in Black and
White by Charles Silberman-"one of the very few white writers I know with the courage to tell his
kind the truth"; and he asked me to make anote to please telephone the New York Post's
feature writer Helen Dudar and tell her he thought very highly of her recent series-he did not want
to commend her directly.
After the Ed Harvey Show was concluded, we took the train to return to New York City. The parlor
car, packed with businessmen behind their newspapers, commuting homeward after their
workdays, was electric with Malcolm X's presence. After the white-jacketed Negro porter had
made several trips up and down the aisle, he was in the middle of another trip when Malcolm X
sotto-voced in my ear, "He used to work with me, I forget his name, we worked right on this
very train together. He knows it's me. He's trying to make up his mind what to do." The porter
went on past us, poker-faced. But when he came through again, Malcolm X suddenly leaned
forward from his seat, smiling at the porter. "Why, sure, I know who you are!" the porter suddenly
said, loudly. "You washed dishes right on this train! I was just telling some of the fellows you were
in my car here. We all follow you!"
The tension on the car could have been cut with a knife. Then, soon, the porter returned to
Malcolm X, his voice expansive. "One of our guests would like to meet you." Now a young, clean-
cut white man rose and came up, his hand extended, and Malcolm X rose and shook the
proffered hand firmly. Newspapers dropped just below eye-level the length of the car. The young
white man explained distinctly, loudly, that he had been in the Orient for a while, and now was
studying at Columbia. "I don't agree with everything you say," he told Malcolm X, "but I have to
admire your presentation."
Malcolm's voice in reply was cordiality itself. "I don't think you could search America, sir, and find
two men who agree on everything." Subsequently, to another white man, an older businessman,
who came up and shook hands, he said evenly, "Sir, I know how you feel. It's a hard thing to
speak out against mewhen you are agreeing with so much that I say." And we rode on into New
York under, now, a general open gazing.
In Washington, D.C., Malcolm X slashed at the government's reluctance to take positive steps in
the Negro's behalf. I gather that even the White House took notice, for not long afterward I left off
interviewing Malcolm X for a few days and went to the White House to do a Playboy interview
of the then White House Press Secretary Pierre Salinger, who grimaced spontaneously when I
said I was writing the life story of Malcolm X. Another time I left Malcolm X to interview the U.S.
Nazi Party Commander George Lincoln Rockwell, who frankly stated that he admired the courage
of Malcolm X, and he felt that the two of them should speak together across the United States,
and they could thus begin a real solution to the race problem-one of voluntary separation of the
white and black races, with Negroes returning to Africa. I reported this to Malcolm X, who snorted,
"He must think I'm nuts! What am I going to look like going speaking with a devil!" Yet
another time, I went off to Atlanta and interviewed for Playboy Dr. Martin Luther King. He was
privately intrigued to hear little-known things about Malcolm X that I told him; for publication, he
discussed him with reserve, and he did say that he would sometime like to have an opportunity to
talk with him. Hearing this, Malcolm X said drily, "You think I ought to send him a telegram with my
telephone number?" (But from other things that Malcolm X said to me at various times, I deduced