Leo Rost

Journalist Paul L. Williams' CRESCENT MOON RISING Examines Rise of Islam in America

In 1975, Leo Rosten published his Religions of America, an exhaustive compilation of statistical information on every major and minor group of believers in the country. In retrospect, it may seem surprising that the book contained no discussion of Islam. But this was not an oversight; for at the time Muslims in America were a statistically insignificant minority, numbering fewer than one thousand individuals. By contrast, Islam is today the second-largest and fastest growing religion in America, with more than six million adherents.