Malcolm X didn't have the ideal childhood, but he made the best out of it. He grew up to be a respected man by some people while not so much by others. Malcolm helped to better the lives of others by spreading the message of well respected men. Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little on May 25,1924 in Omaha, Nebraska to Earl Little, a preacher, and Louise Little, a homemaker. Malcolm's father worked with the civil rights movement, due to this their family was harassed frequently by white groups such as the KKK. Before Malcolm was born, he experienced his first encounter with the KKK and their racism when his mother was harassed by them, while pregnant with him. The KKK came into the Little's home shouting for his father to come out while they had loaded rifles with them. In latter years the harassment from the KKK to the Little family did not die down any, in fact when Malcolm was four years old everything got worse causing his father to move their family from Omaha to East Lansing Michigan (Malcolm X Biography).
Malcolm's family moved to East Lansing, Michigan to get away from the racism and harassment that they faced back in Omaha, but they still faced the same harassment even though they moved. In East Lansing the harassment may have even been worse than it was in Omaha. A racist mob set the house on fire that the Little family lived in during 1929, while policemen and firefighters stood there and watched their house burn to the ground. The harassment towards the Little family got even worse in 1931 when one day his father's lifeless body was found. The little family believed the killing of Malcolm's father was from the people that sent him death threats in the past, but the police thought that he had killed himself, ultimately ruling his death a suicide. Malcolm's mother later went into shock and never recovered from his father's death and later went to a mental institution. After that Malcolm was raised by family and family friends.