Instead, he turned to alternative medicine, featuring herbs, diet and spirituality.

"He believed the body could heal itself," said his wife, Traffic Court Judge Earlene Green. "He would hear of some new alternative treatment and send me out to find out about it."

Who knows whether his approach added time to his life?

He and his wife believed it did. But the cancer eventually proved fatal. He died Tuesday. He was 72 and lived in Overbrook Hills.

Dwight Macklin, a Marine veteran and entrepreneur who operated a furniture store and later a used car lot and auto repair center in West Philadelphia, was a man of many interests.

Not the least of them was politics. He encouraged Green in her run for Traffic Court in 2003. Also, he was thrilled when Barack Obama ran for president and eagerly followed the progress of his campaign.

"He was really tuned into politics," his wife said.

Dwight was a history buff and devoted student of many subjects - including religion and science, even taking in quantum physics - and a traveler who enjoyed frequent visits to the Caribbean.

But cancer changed his life. He became a student of all forms of new age healing. He patronized numerous shops and alternative sources to obtain what he believed were life-giving medicinals.

He was a longtime vegetarian, as is his wife, and studied the effects of diet on illness.

"He believed that if he had been a meat-eater he would not have had the quality of life that he had," said his wife, a cancer survivor.

Dwight was hospitalized frequently at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, where the Myrna Brind Center of Integrative Medicine encouraged his alternative treatments.

He and his wife were married in 2005. It was the third marriage for both.

"He heard me being interviewed on the radio about my practicing holistic health," said Green, who holds a doctor of divinity degree from the Universal Life Church.

"I gave my phone number on the air and he got in touch with me. He said he wanted to see the 'lady with the voice.' "

After a period during which they were just friends, traveling together to healing resorts and cultural events, they began dating and eventually married.

Dwight was born in South Hill, Va., to the now-late Willie Macklin and Betty Lambert Macklin Jacobs. He came to Philadelphia as a child and graduated from Overbrook High School.

He enlisted in the Marines and served from 1954 to 1957, attaining the rank of corporal. After his discharge, he attended Morgan State University, in Baltimore, studying business, economics and chemistry for two years.

After operating a furniture store, he and his uncle Harvey Lambert ran a used-car and auto repair shop at 43rd and Market streets for about 10 years until his uncle's death.

In the '60s, Dwight discovered Islam. He became a Muslim after hearing a speech by Elijah Muhammad, then leader of the Nation of Islam.

"He said he never heard anything that sounded like the truth before that," his wife said.

Dwight had a million stories and liked to regale family and friends with what his wife described as "back-in-the-day" stories of his life and the old days.

Besides his wife and mother, he is survived by a son, Nasir Macklin; an adopted son, Shandell Taylor; and two stepchildren, Jared Taylor and Angela Waller.

Services: Janazah Prayer Service 11 a.m. today at the Philadelphia Masjid, 4700 Wyalusing Ave. Burial will be in Beverly National Cemetery, in Beverly, N.J. *