The VFW building at 300 Veteran’s Drive just south of town is looking a little different these days.

The property, which has historically been owned by the local Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) members, is being leased out by DOWA - the conglomeration of several former VFW members who are currently engaged in litigation with their previous chapter here.

The ongoing property dispute between DOWA and VFW members has the two headed for the Georgia Court of Appeals as early as this spring. The pending Appeals hearing has delayed the return of the VFW members to the property.

The current occupant of 300 and 301 Veteran’s Drive leasing the property from DOWA is Rev. Donald McIntyre.

When asked by The Times about any notice or knowledge of a request by the current owners to vacate the property, Rev. McIntyre said he had “heard nothing” and had “not been notified by the owner of anything.”

According to McIntyre, he has been in Thomaston for several years and has been living in the house located on the VFW property just next door to the large post building.

The property is currently home to around a dozen large Egyptian statues in the front lawn of the old VFW building.

McIntyre stated that he holds a “service” on Sunday afternoons for those interested in learning what he refers to as “the truth.”

This truth, according to McIntyre, is based from the Nuwaupian doctrine, founded by the quasi-religious United Nations of Moors leader, (Dwight) Malachi Z. York, as he was last known.

The Nuwaupians were recently the subject on Dr. Phil, the syndicated afternoon television talk-therapist show.

Nuwaubianism, as to which most refer this doctrine, is the umbrella term for the combined religious-based doctrine, scientific and historic beliefs of the followers of York.

The Nuwabian teachings are a mixture of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, ancient Egypt, and the Nineteenth plane of a different universe.

Excerpts from “OUR STORY”, the history (written by York) of The Holy Tabernacle Ministries states, “...And this is how it all began. The mission of our master teacher formed in the late nineteen sixties A.D. under the name Amunnnubi Rooakhptah, an unknown writer of the Science of Nuwaubu. Knowing the Nubians weren’t ready for that level of information as of yet, I [York] started teaching under the name

Imaam Isa, for Muslims seemed to be the most influential movements of that time... I set up headquarters in Brooklyn.”

After “metamorphisizing” several times, from the Nubian

veil-wearing Islamic Hebrews, to Sudanese-influenced; a time when York claimed the Arabs deliberately mis-translated verses of the Qur’aan to confuse non-arabic speaking Nubians in the West.... to the Catskills Mountains where they were under the tests of “nineteen weeks of the faithful”, called the Jazzir Abba.

It was then the Nuwabian group saw Georgia as the “Mecca of the West.”

York and his followers established, “Tama-Re”, Egypt of the West, a living “compound”, complete with 40-foot pyramids, obelisks, statues of gods and goddesses, and even a giant sphinx.

The traditional arabic-type dress changed to “western” country wear.

York wrote of this time, “Many who followed other teachers, are finding their way to the Lamb. The sun is truly coming out of the east and unto the west and those who endure to the end are receiving the crown of life, in The Ancient Mystic Order Melchizedek; Where this message is coming forth to you with the Scroll of Malachi (York), that rebukes the liars for their transgressions, and who will prepare the way for the Messiah by turning the hearts of the fathers to sons and the sons to fathers, or else, I, Malachi, will strike the Earth with utter destruction.”

York continued in his writings regarding the new Mecca in Georgia, “...Only now we are Sufi under the A.M.O.M the Ancient Mystic Order of Melchizedek. The beginning and the end. You can’t be fooled by any religious doctrine of any kind.”

York is currently serving 135 years in prison after a May 2002 raid on a Putnam County (Eatonton) compound, “Lodge No. 19”, and subsequent January 2004 trial convicting him of racketeering, conspiracy to transport minors for unlawful sex, charges of structuring cash transactions to avoid reporting requirements.

In an April 2004 trial, a federal judge sentenced York on racketeering and 14 child molestation convictions.

York and his followers came from Brooklyn, N.Y. to Putnam County in 1993, where they built the “Holy Tabernacle Ministries” on a 476-acre farm land.

After York was convicted, the Eatonton compound was flattened by the F.B.I. and the followers dispersed.

The group has been known to have property and other holdings in Athens (where York owned a house and meeting lodge), Savannah, Macon, and other areas, possibly Albany and Augusta.

Thomaston can be added to that list. (Including once having a, now-closed, Nuwaubian bookstore located downtown, A.E.O.E. - All Eyes On Egypt.)

At the time of York’s Eatonton trials, many members of the United Nuwaubian Nation of Moors also considered themselves to be a part of the Yamassee Native American Moors.

According to Derrick “Black Hawk” Sanders, a self-proclaimed leader stepping in after York’s imprisonment, the Yamassee are actually a group of African Americans that came across an “ancient land bridge” from Africa to America.

The Nuwaubians consider themselves a mixture of the ancient African Egyptians and Ancient Native Americans. To this mixture, they also believe York came from the 19th Galaxy called “Illyuwn” on the planet, “Rizq.”

McIntyre explained to The Times that everything consists of energy on separate planes. We are all on these different planes of this energy, according McIntyre and there is no beginning or end to this.

McIntyre continued to explain that the planet Rizq is/was looking for sources of energy that they found in gold on Earth. They came to retrieve this gold. Those that believe the Nuwaubian “truths”, according to McIntyre, will be eventually returned to their appropriate energy plane in their galaxy.

The towering Egyptian statutes that rest at 300 Veteran Drive today are there as symbols of the Nuwaubian belief (and heritage from Africa).

McIntyre explained that after the land in Eatonton was taken from the Nuwaubians, they moved to other areas in Georgia. He choose Thomaston because of its quiet, out-of-the-way atmosphere and because he felt drawn here.

As the VFW trial continues, The Times will be reporting on the case and the outcome... and on the future of the Nuwaubians at that site.