Archaeologists start dig at Malcolm X's boyhood home

BOSTON - Archeologists in Boston are digging at the boyhood home of slain black rights activist Malcolm X.

The two-week archaeological dig begins Tuesday in Boston's Roxbury neighborhood.

Organizers say they hope to find out more about Malcolm X's early life.

Members of his family and community residents are expected to help Boston's Archaeology Lab and researchers from the University of Massachusetts-Boston undertake the excavation.

His time in Boston was difficult, but transformative. The former Malcolm Little lived with his sister's family there in the 1940s as a teenager. He was sent to the state prison in Charlestown in 1946 on a burglary charge. It was there he was introduced to the teachers of the Nation of Islam.

Malcolm X was the moniker Little adopted as he became a minister and the principal spokesman for the Nation of Islam in the 1950s and 60s.

Little eventually renounced the radical black Muslim group and was gunned down by its followers at a speech in New York City in 1965.