Zelaron Gaming Forum - View Single Post - Non-racially aware people read this.

zonalon · 09:41 AM

The following was taken from the Bloomington, Ill. "Daily Bulletin", Feb. 21, 1922, page 1:

Headline: "Thanks to the Ku Klux Klan, Shawnee, Okla." - Negro comes into newspaper office, asks that letter be printed. "To members of the Ku Klux Klan - Greetings - We wish to thank you for your courtesy for helping to stop dishonesty and immoral practices in this section of town. We will appreciate any future steps that you may take to completely wipe out these practices. (signed) The Colored Secret Spying Society of South Town.

The following was taken from the Bloomington, Ill. "Daily Pantagraph" Sept. 17, 1924:

Headline: "Klansmen donate to Negro Church". Galesburg - 100 robed men walked into colored church during services and gave $65.00 to pastor with note, "The Klan is your friend."

The following was taken from Chicago's "Dawn", Dec. 23, 1922:

Headline: "Black Billy Sunday in Ft. Worth, Tx. likes Klan, preaches at St. James Church".

From "Dawn" Nov. 24, 1923, page 11:

Headline: "Negroes refuse to join war on Klan in Suffolk, N.Y.; nine of sixteen ministers with Catholics say Klan isn't harmful to them. Just against intermarriage."

From "Dawn", Oct. 20, 1923, page 10:

Headline: "Dixon Klan gives to Negro Baptist Church". At the Sunday service, Oct. 14, at the Colored Baptist Church here, the local organization of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan presented the congregation with an envelope containing four ten dollar bills. About three weeks ago the minister of this congregation received a letter ordering him to leave the city within twelve hours and letter was signed K.K.K., which is merely another example of the false propaganda being sent out by those who oppose this American organization. ... The minister responded with his thanks and assured us that it was received in the proper spirit, and would be used in the proper way. He also said if the Klan is composed of such men and holds such high principles his prayer to God is for more Klansmen."

From "Dawn", Dec. 2, page 8:

Headline: "Klan visits Negro Preacher." Sour Lake, Tx. - The Negro Methodist church was the scene of an extraordinary sensation last Sunday afternoon when several white robed Klansmen entered the building and presented the pastor with a donation of $40.00 and a message of encouragement. The visit followed the request of the pastor to Rev. Charles W. Hughes, pastor of the First Methodist church, to assist him in raising funds for religious work in the Colored community. Rev. Hughes delivered a sermon on "Money" before the dusky congregation and assisted in taking up the collection."

Also, from that same page of "Dawn":

Headline: "Negro leader learns Klan is friend." Madison, Wis. - The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and the Negroes of Madison have buried the hatchet. This was indicated the other day by statements of Klan leaders and Rev. F.J. Peterson, pastor of the African Bethel church, who is regarded as a local leader of his race. The pastor acknowledged receipt of a donation of $25.00 made by the Klansmen. "The board of trustees of our church regards the donation as being made in good faith and has accepted it as such," Rev. Peterson said. "It has helped to dispel natural prejudices and to encourage better feeling. ...In a letter which accompanied the gift, it is declared that reports that the Ku Klux Klan is an anti-Negro organization are untrue."

A summing up of the New Jersey KKK. Much of the following was taken from, "Hooded Americanism, the History of the Ku Klux Klan", by David Chalmers, the "Good Citizen" magazine, and Klan records.

The KKK first spread to New Jersey from the states of New York and Pennsylvania early in 1921 and has had a history of being a peaceful Klan. Attorney Arthur Bell was N.J.'s first and longest reigning Grand Dragon. He ruled the New Jersey KKK right up to the Klan's disbandment in the 1940's. His wife Leah Bell was the state leader of the Women of the Ku Klux Klan. The Klan's first strongholds were in Passaic, Bergen, Essex, Union, and Morris counties and in the area around Trenton and Camden. But the Klan grew strongest in Monmouth county.

In the mid-twenties, the Klan marched, rallied, and worshipped. It reached a membership of around 100,000. The Klan built Monroe Recreational Park and Shark River Recreational Park, where the Grand Dragon lived and the Imperial Wizard visited. (The Klan placed the valuable Shark River Recreational Park in the name of the Monmouth Pleasure Club Association.

Before long the Klan prospered and spread throughout the state. It's purposes were to protect the Constitution and pure womanhood; preserve the White race, the separation of church and state, and uphold law and order. There were no substantiated reports of actual Klan violence and ceremonial cross lightings were common. Drunkenness, wife beatings, mixed marriages, child abuse, and immorality were particularly opposed by the N.J. Klan. Apart from it's nocturnal rituals and fraternalism, the primary concern of the N.J. Klan was the preservation of the traditional American values. As the Klan's Tri-K-Girls put it, "The return to the teachings of our mothers." This meant stressing the virtues of Christian fundamentalism and temperance. It was not surprising, therefore, that in New Jersey this often led to friendly relations and co-operation with many churches.

It became characteristic of the N.J. Klan to receive support from the ministry. Although Baptist, Presbyterian, Dutch Reformed, and Evangelical pastors and churches supplied pulpits and prestige for the Klan, its truest friends came from the Pillar of Fire Church and the Methodists. Bishop Alma White's religious community of Zarepath (near Bound Brook) favored the Klan which they saw as an ally in the fight to protect bible Christianity against modern distortions and criticism. The Pillar of Fire Church looked with favor upon the Klan's fiery cross. Bishop White praised the Klan by sermon, book, and in the church's Good Citizen publication. Bishop White also predicted that the Klan would be popular among the colleges starting with Princeton University. The Imperial Wizard visited the Bishop White at her Zarepath church grounds several times.

Klansmen appeared at friendly churches such as the Third Presbyterian in Elizabeth, the Grace Methodist in Kearney, the First Baptist in Bayonne, the Calvary Methodist Episcopal in Paterson, the Grace Methodist Episcopal in Newark, and the Colonial United Methodist Church in Oxford. Usually they entered "robed up", sat in reserved sections, donated money to the minister, gave talks on why the Klan favored positive Christianity, and peacefully departed as church choirs sang "Onward Christian Soldiers". While approving Klansmen and congregations listened, ministers gave special sermons on Americanism, and quoted from Romans 12:1, the Klan's verse of the New Testament.

In Monmouth and Ocean Counties Klansmen regularly paraded through the streets of Long Branch, Asbury Park, Point Pleasant, and Lakewood on their way to Sunday morning services. Members of the clergy joined the Klan. The recruiters and speakers of the N.J. Klan were often ministers and some pastors headed Klaverns or held state or local Klan office. Of all the denominations, the ministers of the Methodist Episcopal Church were most prominent in Klan affairs. Many ministers in New Jersey felt that it was part of their duty to seek out and reproach transgressors. They warmly approved joint efforts with the Klan to carry it out. The principal objectives of their concern were usually immorality and drunkenness. In Asbury Park, the Civic Church League and the Klan met at the First Methodist Episcopal Church to combine forces against such. Although vice was always a matter of concern, the bond uniting Klan and churchmen was a common struggle against alcohol abuse. During this time the KKK donated money to the Negro church of Belmar and paid off the mortgage to the Negro church of Vineland.

In the spring of 1923, the Klan went to the state assembly to support a bill to permit New Testament readings in public schools. (Such was not considered a violation of the separation of church and state at the time.) Later that summer the Klan and the Ministerial Association of Plainfield joined in opposition to Sabbath breaking. Some ministers preached that the Klan was the only hope of bringing straying Christians back into the fold, and the Grand Dragon promised that he would strive to return New Jersey to "The Old Time Religion". In the village of Atco, near Camden, the Klan participated in the dedication of a new non-denominational church. Throughout the 1920's, the relationship between Klan and clergy continued. Klansmen and churchmen joined to sponsor Senator Heflin for president at a rally at Upsala College. In Atlantic City, the extremely active local Klansmen accused the city government of protecting vice and lawlessness. The Klan took part in the Flag Day parade in Bloomfield. In 11926, the Unity Klan No. 17 of Rahway and Linden sponsored a fund raising drive to rebuild the Negro Church of Carteret. The banner on photo below reads: "Help Us To Rebuild The Negro Church Of Carteret".

http://www.kkklan.com/various3.gif

In 1923, H.L. Mencken and George Jean Nathan, recognized critics of the American scene, described the Ku Klux Klan for Smart Set, their journal of satirical sophistication. They flayed every organizational aspect of the national life. Sparing no one, majority or minority, they connected the KKK with all that was ludicrous and unwarranted in a society which they felt represented mediocracy. They wrote:

"Not a single solitary sound reason has yet been advanced for putting the Ku Klux Klan out of business. If the Klan is against the Jews, so are half of the good hotels of the Republic and three-quarters of the good clubs. If the Klan is against the foreign born or the hyphenated citizen, so is the National Institute of Arts and Letters. If the Klan is against the Negro, so are all of the states south of the Mason-Dixon line. If the Klan is for damnation and persecution, so is the Methodist Church. If the Klan is bent upon political control, so are the American Legion and Tammany Hall. If the Klan wears grotesque uniforms, so do the Knights of Pythias and Mystic Shriners. If the Klan holds its meetings in the dead of night, so do the Elks. If the Klan conducts its business in secret, so do all college Greek letter fraternities and the Department of State. If the Klan holds idiotic parades in the public streets, so do the police, the letter-carriers, and firemen. If the Klan's officers bear ridiculous names, so do the officers of the Lambs' Club. If the Klan uses the mails for shaking down suckers, so does the Red Cross. If the Klan constitutes itself a censor of private morals, so does the Congress of the United States. If the Klan lynches a Moor for raping someone's daughter, so would you or I."