Jennifer Rubin is a political columnist for the Washington Post. In a recent column about the rise of fascism and white supremacy recently in America she recommended a book on the subject. That book is A Fever In The Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot To Take Over America, And The Woman Who Stopped Them, by Timothy Egan.
It was a significant eye opener for me. The time period was the first years of the 1920s. The center of KKK activity was Indiana and the majority of Klan membership and activity was in northern states. The trifecta was men for muscle, woman for evangelizing for the Klan and Protestant pastors who gave spiritual cover.
Hate is a powerful motivator as we see so clearly today. The primary targets of Klan hatred were African Americans, Jews and Catholics. With a surfeit of hate the Klan also vented its poison on Asians and immigrants from southern Europe. Eugenics was also a nasty part of the program. Under the banner of 'AMERICANISM' atrocities flourished.
The mastermind of the expansion of the Klan, /Stephanson, met his match in a young women, Madge Oberholtzer. The book becomes a page turner, after the opening chapters recounting the amazing success of the Klan, when Stephanson is faced with Oberholtzer's testimony in a murder trial.
My recommendation? Read it! Read it! Read it!
Takk for alt,
Al
Working on my latest acquisition. It's a rear mounted, four row, corn cultivator manufactured in the 1960s. 😀 Nothing but the finest.
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