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KKK members parade down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C., on August 8, 1925.

When the KKK Came to D.C.

Revisiting a 1925 march through the eyes of Black newspapers.
The Ku Klux Klan parading near the Capitol Building in 1925, holding American flags.

What Felt Impossible Became Possible

George Dale's crusade against the Ku Klux Klan.
Ku Kluz Klan imperial wizard Hiram Wesley Evans.

Making Sense of the Second Ku Klux Klan

Understanding the reemergence of the Ku Klux Klan in the early twentieth century gives insight into the roots of today’s reactionary activists and policymakers.
Image of the outline of the United States in red fire.

A Dark Reminder of What American Society Has Been and Could Be Again

How an obsessive hatred of immigrants and people of color and deep-seated fears about the empowerment of women led to the Klan’s rule in Indiana.
Ulysses S. Grant finishing his memoir shortly before he died.

Grant vs. the Klan

New books reconsider how Ulysses S. Grant became a forceful defender of the rights of African Americans after the Civil War.
Horace M. Kallen c. 1929. Courtesy of The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Kultur Klux Klan and Cultural Pluralism at One Hundred

Looking back at Horace M. Kallen's collection of essays entitled "Culture and Democracy in the United States."
A large KKK Rally with burning crosses in the background.

100 Years Ago, the KKK Planted Bombs at a US University – Part of Their Crusade Against Catholics

Most of the Klan’s victims were African American, but many other groups have been targeted during the hate group’s century and a half of history.
The cover of The Black Mask magazine, June 1, 1923, featuring a hooded Klan member.

The Gumshoes Who Took On the Klan

In the pages of "Black Mask" magazine, the Continental Op and Race Williams fought the KKK even as they shared its love of vigilante justice.
Painting called "Hudibras’ Discomfiture at the Hands of the Skimmington," by Francis Le Piper, seventeenth century.

American Charivari

The history and context of the made-up aesthetics of the early Ku Klux Klan.
Rows of Klansmen in white hoods with faces exposed march on Washington; the dome of the Capitol is visible in the background.

When the Klan Ruled Indiana… And Had Plans to Spread Its Empire of Hate Across America

The Klan dens of the heartland were powerful, vicious, and ambitious. Indiana was their bastion.
KKK march overlaid on J. Edgar Hoover

How Hoover Took Down the Klan

The FBI’s successful campaign against white supremacists is also a cautionary tale.
Dual circular images of fire, representing seeing fire through the eye holes of a klan hood

Sins of the Fathers

In Life of a Klansman, Edward Ball’s white supremacist great-great-grandfather becomes a case study in the enduring legacy of slavery.

Mocking the Klan

Was cartoonist Billy Ireland’s pen really mightier than the burning crosses of the KKK?
Two hooded KKK members

The Ku Klux Klan Was Also a Bosses’ Association

The KKK violently resisted the revolutionary gains of the Civil War and Reconstruction, and sought to keep the black masses toiling in submission.
Chinese immigrants working in a market stop to pose for a photo

The California Klan’s Anti-Asian Crusade

Whereas southern Klansmen assaulted Black Americans and their white allies, western vigilantes targeted those they deemed a greater threat: Chinese immigrants.
Members of the Harvard branch of the KKK pose for 1924 graduation photo at the foot of John Harvard Statue

The Crimson Klan

The KKK was clearly present at Harvard. But the university rarely mentions the 20th century in its attempts to reckon with its past.
Collage of a photo of the mayor superimposed on a photo of a large KKK rally in a stadium.

The Los Angeles Mayor Who Was Also a KKK Leader

In 1929, Mayor Porter was part of a long history of city figures who perpetuated white supremacy as a foundational and systemic ideal.
Mount Rushmore National Memorial in South Dakota.

The Creator of Mount Rushmore’s Forgotten Ties to White Supremacy

Sculptor Gutzon Borglum was deeply involved with the Ku Klux Klan while designing the Confederate memorial at Stone Mountain, Ga.
Part of the pedestal of a monument, inscribed with the words "Bright angels come and guard our sleeping heroes."

The Even Uglier Truth Behind Athens Confederate Monument

It was intended to be a tool of political power, sending a message against Black voting and serving as a gathering point for the Ku Klux Klan.
Rows and rows of Ku Klux Klan members marching in front of the U.S. Capitol in 1925.

When the KKK Played Against an All-Black Baseball Team

For the white-robed, playing a black team was a gift-wrapped photo op, a chance to show that the Klan was part of the local community.

The Day the Native Americans Drove the KKK Out of Town

The North Carolina Klan thought burning crosses would scare the Lumbee tribe out of Robeson County. That’s not how things went down.

#MeToo, Networks of Complicity, and the 1920s Klan

How the Klan’s extensive networks of patriarchal power enabled abusive men to prey on women.
Four Ku Klux Klan members wearing robes and hoods.

The Ku Klux Klan and America’s First "Fake News" Crisis

When the white-supremacist group terrorized the South during Reconstruction, many people denied that it even existed.
Hooded people kneel before a cross at a Ku Klux Klan rally.

When the Klan Came to Town

History reminds us that firm and sometimes violent opposition to racists is a time-honored American tradition.
Map of Oregon

Oregon’s Racist Past

Until the mid-20th century, Oregon was perhaps the most racist place outside the southern states, possibly even of all the states.

Voices in Time: The KKK Makes Its Case in Mass Media

The author of "The Second Coming of the KKK" shows an early twentieth-century attempt to go mainstream.
KKK parade
partner

How Social Media Spread a Historical Lie

A mix of journalistic mistakes and partisan hackery advanced a pernicious lie about Democrats and the Klan.

The Media and the Ku Klux Klan: A Debate That Began in the 1920s

The author of "Ku Klux Kulture" breaks down the ‘mutually beneficial’ relationship between the Klan and the media.
Woman in a KKK hood holding a baby.

No, Talking About Women's Role in White Supremacy is NOT Blaming Women

Women’s role in the 1920s KKK can teach us about racism today.
KKK march in Washington in 1925.

The Second Klan

Linda Gordon’s new book captures how white supremacy has long been part of our political mainstream.

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