Shaykh Allama Al-Hajj Ahmad Tawfiq, the founding Imam of the Mosque Islamic Brotherhood, Inc., was born in Newberry, South Carolina on September 20, 1936. He came to New York City at the age of eight and attended schools in New York City. He was athletically talented all of his life. As an adolescent, he played football for DeWitt Clinton High School, and enjoyed swimming. As an adult he took to long-distance running and excelled in martial arts. He also possessed a musical talent that he developed through studies at the Manhattan School of Music, where he became proficient on the French Horn. Shaykh Tawfiq played with the Prince Hall Symphony Band and later conducted the Cairo Symphony Orchestra.
