The Ku Klux Klan

1
The Ku Klux Klan

• By Patty Fuchs

2
The Beginning of the KKK

• First meeting was in Pulaski, Tennessee, near
  the Alabama border
• six former confederate army officers gathered
  on the evening of December 24, 1865
• the name Ku Klux Klan came from the word
  kuklos meaning circle in Greek and the English
  word clan.

3
The Three Stages of the KKK

• the first stage was following the Civil War
  the Klan was created to meet the threat posed
  by the newly freed slaves.
• the Second stage was during the First World War
  which brought back the KKK to deal with the
  changes in the United States in the American
  Way including immigration and migration of the
  rural South to Northern cities by Negroes
• the third stage was during the period when
  there was a resurrection of the Klan with the
  threat posed by the Supreme Court decisions in
  the fifties with the fight against its evildoers

4

• History
  of the Klan
• In 1867 the Klan was structured as the
  Invisible Empire of the South
• Nathan Forrest was a general of Conferdeate
  Calvary who was the believed to be the first
  grand wizard of the Klan
• 19th century the Klan reached its peak between
  1868 and 1870
• 1869 Forrest ordered the disbandment of the Klan
  due to the amount of violence they were doing but
  local branches remained active
• they whipped and killed freedmen and the white
  people who supported them in night raids.
• 1870 Congress passed the Force Act and the Ku
  Klux Act in 1871
• 1915 William Simmons organized the Klan in Stone
  Mountain, Georgia as a group not just against
  blacks but against any un-American people.

5
Invisible Empire

• Membership to this group was allowed if you were
  native-born, white, protestant males, 16 years
  of age or older
• this empire was a big problem for the government
  to control which led to many murders and other
  problems
• in the Invisible empire their was the Grand
  wizard of the empire who was the leader which was
  assisted by ten Geni
• Other were Grand Dragon of the Realm, who was
  assisted by eight Hydras
• The Grand Titan of the Dominion, who was assisted
  by six other furies and the Grand Cyclops of the
  Den who was assisted by two nighthawks
• until the 1920s this society did not have any
  influence
• When the period of economic dislocation the Klan
  became very active with caused the rapid spread
  of the Klan

6
Invisible empire cont

• Georgia 1915 the new society was organized by
  former preacher Co. William Simmons (1880-1945)
• 1921 the Klan had over 100,000 people in the
  invisible empire
• It was ten dollars a head and it was tax free
  since the Klan was a benevolent society

7
History of KKK

• Summer of 1921 the violence grow leading to a
  rampage of whippings, tar-and-feathers raids, and
  use of acid to brand the letters of KKK on the
  foreheads of blacks, Jews and other anti-American
  people
• many people ignored the violence even the
  government and the police

8
History cont

• in 1922 when Hiram Wesley Evans became the next
  imperial wizard for the money which he could get
  out of it the violence grow
• Went after Mexicans, blacks, Jews, Catholics and
  even white, Protestant and female
• Attacked women that sought independence
• In 1922 voters sent Klansmen Earl Mayfield to the
  U.S. senate also elected Klansmen's to governor
  positions in the Southern states

9
History cont

• 1927 Klan broke away from the Invisible empire
  under Evans leadership
• In Terrell, Texas the Klan soaked a man in oil
  and burned him in front of hundreds of Klansmen
• 1930s Klan began to shrink up during the Great
  Depression

10
History

• 1930s in Florida the statewide Klan membership
  was over 30,000 while the nations continued to
  shrink
• the Klan basically came to an end in 1944 when
  the Klan was sued for over 685,000 for back
  taxes on profits they earned in the 1920s
• after this there still was the KKK but less
  people in membership

11
violence

• Night ridings, beating, whipping, and burring of
  cross was some of the things
• they murdered freed and runaway slaves
• They murdered white men who help the slaves
  escape
• They also boycotted business that were owned and
  operated by Jews
• There uniforms were white cloak and hood with
  the symbol of a burning cross

12
Biography

• The Ku Klux Klan Continuuity and Change
• Richard Schaefer, www.jstor.com
• A Hundred Years of Terror. Southern Poverty Law
  Center www.iupui.edu/aao/kkk.html
• Ku Klux Klan, World Almanac, www.2facts.com/WAE/se
  arch/xku058800a.asp