In the name of Allah the Most Beneficent the Most Merciful: I have been all over the Middle East, from Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and so forth. And I must say that Madina and Mecca have absolutely stood apart. One reason is that this is a main pillar of Islam. It is obligatory upon every single Muslim around the world to at least have the sincere intention to make the holy pilgrimag ...

In loving memory, we celebrate the life of Arthur Michael Carter III, born in Detroit on April 27, 1940 as the first-born son of Arthur Carter, Jr. of Milledgeville, Ga., and Alberta (Wright) Carter of Memphis, Tenn. As part of the Great Migration of African Americans from the southern U.S. to northern states in search of opportunity, Art’s father moved to Detroit from Georgia to seek a factory job at Chrys ...

Jesse Long-Bey, longtime Michigan Citizen editor, was admitted to the hospital in early December after a month-long illness. He had suffered a stroke in December 2009 and was in a coma for 30 days but recovered. Jesse was in Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak when he died Jan. 21, 2013 the day of the first Black President Barack Obama’s second inauguration and of the national Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday ...

He had an unusual advantage as an editor — namely, the perspective of one of society’s throwaways, an ex-convict who’d done hard time. Of course, Malcolm X had the same experience. Like Malcolm X, Jesse was forever marked by his time in prison. In his posthumously published autobiography, Malcolm X observed through Alex Haley, his ghostwriter: “Any person who claims to have deep feeling for other human bein ...

Hugh Parker Grannum, III had a way of making everyone he met and each person he photographed feel special. His kindness, expressed in words and deeds, felt like a warm embrace. A jazzy gentleman, who once wanted to be a jazz musician, he found a way to make music with photographs that sang, danced and touched the hearts and souls of people. ...

Educator, humanitarian and mental health activist Dr. Eugene E. Pettis, made his heavenly transition on Jan. 13 at Henry Ford Hospital. Dr. Pettis was 81 years old. A native Detroiter, Dr. Pettis worked for 35 years as a mental health director at Detroit East Mental Health Community Clinic, he was an adjunct professor at Wayne State University and later Wayne County Community College. Dr. Pettis believed an ...

Earl Preston Smith, the fifth of seven children, was born on April 13, 1942 in Cleveland, Ohio to the union of Albert Henry Smith and Annie Elizabeth Black. ...

The Light Of Life, whom we would call Dorothy Dean Mixon, was the eighth of 10 offspring born to Ernest and Ara Mixon on Nov. 27, 1917 in Jackson, Miss. Her siblings all preceded her in death. ...

She attended Hamtramck High and graduated from Detroit’s Osborne High School. In the ‘90s, she was a DJ for Detroit rapper Nikki Nik and had a hit song "Yo Baby Yo," released on Ton Def Records. Chrystal had a long career of discovering artists, poets and authors in the Detroit area and abroad. She was one of the founders and co-owners of SVmixMedia and SVmxRadio.Com. Her warm sense of humor and inviting in ...

Donald M. Suggs, Jr., son of St. Louis American publisher and executive editor Donald M. Suggs, died of heart complications in New York City on Oct. 5, 2012. He was 51. ...