Malcolm X visited Albany to decode NY politics just before assassination FacebookTwitterEmail 1of3 Malcolm X in Albany, New York. January 7, 1965 (Times Union Archive)Times Union Historic ImagesShow MoreShow Less 2of3 Malcolm X & Viola McCain visit the New York State Legislature. January 7, 1965 (Times Union Archive)Times Union Historic ImagesShow MoreShow Less 3of3 When Malcolm X came to Albany in January 1965, he was receiving death threats from two wildly divergent groups of extremists: white racists and Nation of Islam loyalists enraged that he had renounced their leader. Don Hogan Charles (the first black photographer at the New York Times) had taken a famous 1964 Ebony magazine photo of Malcolm X guarding his family and their Queens home, holding an M1 carbine rifle and peering through the parlor window.