Progressive Land Developers Corp.

The 376-acre St Clair County farm owned by the Progressive Land Developers Corp.

The Progressive Land Developers Corp. was a company founded by the Lost Found Nation of Islam in 1963 to promote self-sufficiency. The leader of the Chicago-based religious group, Elijah Muhammad, provided funds to the corporation, which held some properties in trust for him. He controlled 14.5 percent of the corporation's stock, but was not an executive in its administration. The corporation purchased apartment buildings and developable lots in Chicago, Illinois and farmland in Michigan, Illinois, Texas and Georgia before coming to Alabama in 1969.

The corporation planned to operate their farms in the south to raise produce and livestock which would be processed and packaged on site for distribution to stores and restaurants in which the corporation held interest in low-income areas of Chicago.

In June of that year the corporation purchased a 376-acre farm in northern St Clair County for $115,000 from Ray Wyatt, a businessman and former state senator with a Ford dealership in Pell City. In October Wyatt and dentist Robert McClung bought another farm, a 541-acre spread in the southern part of the county which surrounded the Pine Forest Missionary Baptist Church and its cemetery. They purchased the land at auction for $101,000 and then turned and sold it to the corporation for a $20,000 profit. It was only after the second purchase that rumors began to spread that the land had been bought by "Negroes".

Ray's brother, Wallace Wyatt, who was serving as a deacon at Pine Forest Missionary Baptist, confronted him about the sale, and then learned that the buyers were affiliated with the Nation of Islam. Wallace said that he broke a "pledge of confidence" with his brother "in order to uphold the family honor and the honor of this state and nation," when he revealed the details of the transaction to members of his church. The backlash was immediate, as Ray Wyatt and his wife began receiving threatening phone calls. A dozen new automobiles at his dealership were damaged by acid and the business later burned to the ground.

Wyatt claimed that he did not know initially that the corporation had ties to "Black Muslims", but did know the owners were African American, and that he was assured that the farm and proposed $2.5 million food processing business would employ local workers. At one point, Wyatt indicated that he would be involved with the operation as a personnel manager. He said that once he got to know the group, he admired their high morals, as well as the commitment they shared with him that the races should remain segregated and independent.

Progressive Land Developers public relations director Walter Lee Turner organized a visit, by chartered airplane, to an existing "Muhammad Farms" operation in Terrell County, Georgia. He explained that the farm was operating successfully and contributing to the community's economy without any trouble from neighbors. Wyatt hoped those efforts would help win public support.

Those hopes were unfounded, though, as the possibility of a large "Black Muslim" presence in the area continued to stoke fears. Wyatt Wallace joined Baptist minister J. H. Bishop in founding a group known as "Restore Integrity to Development" (or "R.I.D.") which pledged to employ every legal means of stopping the establishment of the farms and food processing plants. Bishop, told a gathering of 2,000 white residents at Ashville High School that he was 'willing to lay down my life for the cause if need be." Ku Klux Klan imperial wizard Robert Shelton, who had just been released from federal prison, came to the county to support the opposition. He claimed that the proposed business was "a threat to Christianity" and "part of a concentrated effort to take over the eight states of the Bible Belt." He claimed that the Klan was buying up property around the farm "to keep an eye on things," though reporters were not able to document any land sales tied to him or the group.

On December 4 Blount and St Clair County district attorney L. P. Waid had Ray Wyatt arrested and charged with representing