Inside the Klavern: The Secret History of a Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s

By David A. Horowitz

Book Overview

Inside the Klavern is an annotated collection of the minutes of a thriving Ku Klux Klan in La Grande, Oregon, between 1922 and 1924. The most complete set of Klan minutes ever uncovered, these documents illustrate the inner workings of a Klan chapter of more than three hundred members at a time when the national membership reached into the millions and the Invisible Empire was at the peak of its power. Through an extensive introduction and conclusion as well as brief notes previewing each installment of the minutes, David A. Horowitz places these unique documents in historical perspective.

The La Grande minutes demonstrate Klan hostility to Roman Catholics, Jews, blacks, and hyphenated Americans. But they also explain how the chapter exercised requirements for admission, how officers were selected, and how Klansmen encountered difficulties enforcing the moral standards of their order. Because the Klan kligrapp (recording secretary) Harold R. Fosner recorded not only the official proceedings but also volunteered extemporaneous comments and gossip, readers get a genuine feeling for what it was like to attend the meetings. Through his own obvious excitement and commitment to the cause, Fosner re-creates the flavor, tone, and atmosphere of these meetings: Tis beyond my power of expression to relate the harmony and fellowship which reigned supreme. . . . Suffice to say that these were the golden moments of our lives.

His evaluation of Klan propaganda, too, is telling: The weekly newsletter from Atlanta, Georgia, contained a little book, the official message of our emperor, one Col. William Joseph Simmons, read before the most noble band of men ever assembled and for the noblest cause in the world. To my firm belief this book is the leading masterpiece of our day and age.

Horowitz concludes that although it is tempting to judge Jazz Age Klansmen by the standards of later generations, the story provided by the minutes is a complex one--a chronicle of both compassion and complicity in cruelty, of positive social accomplishment and arbitrary and dysfunctional divisiveness.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 080932248X
• ISBN13: 9780809322480
• Release Date: June 1999
• Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.0" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

A staple for Klan scholars anywhere

David Horowitz has provided the scholarly community focusing of the Ku Klux Klan with an incredbily useful tool; the actual minutes from a Klan in La Grande, Oregon. With his brilliantly edited volume, Horowitz provides interesting insights into Klan functions, dress, politics, commerce and attitudes as told by Kligrapp Harold Fosner. What is more amazing though is that these records have survived, and through Horowitz's dilligence, they have been recovered from the Oregon Historical Society and made available by Southern Illinois Univeristy press. The historigraphy of Klan study has been altered greatly thanks to Horowiz's work, as speculation in past work can be either confirmed or refuted by examining Inside the Klavern, if in fact the La Grande Klan is a true representation of small town Klans nationally. A terrific read for all.