Inside the Klu Klux Klan

AuthorHouse

Contents

PROLOGUE..................................................................................XIPART I - DISCOVERING THE KLANChapter One Rumors and Myths: The Fear and Lure of The White Knights.....................1Chapter Two Meeting The Wizard...........................................................4Chapter Three Attending a Meeting........................................................9Chapter Four Sign Me Up..................................................................13PART II - ACCEPTANCEChapter Five Learning Some History.......................................................16Chapter Six Gaining Trust................................................................20Chapter Seven The Tompkinsville Pipeline.................................................25Chapter Eight Making Inroads.............................................................30PART III - THE RIDE TO THE TOPChapter Nine Shot Down In Cold Blood.....................................................34Chapter Ten Meeting My Nemesis...........................................................37Chapter Eleven Volunteering To Act.......................................................40Chapter Twelve Making Grand Dragon.......................................................44PART IV - APEX OF POWERChapter Thirteen Learning Secrets........................................................46Chapter Fourteen Coalition with The Skinheads, or Not?...................................49Chapter Fifteen The Rally................................................................56Chapter Sixteen Something Must Be done...................................................59PART V - BETRAYALChapter Seventeen Disobeying Orders......................................................68Chapter Eighteen No Honor Among Thieves..................................................71Chapter Nineteen Pressure to Cooperate...................................................75Chapter Twenty Betrayal At The Top.......................................................78Epiloge...................................................................................82Appendix..................................................................................84

Chapter One

In south-central Kentucky where I was raised until my early teens, the rumors of the Ku Klux Klan run rampant. They are believed to be all around you, yet unidentifiable, even aloof from the every day activities of local inhabitants. They are almost like spirits that hover, invisibly, to see every move you make. It is not something a man thinks about all the time, but occasionally, when the subject comes up in casual conversation, the feeling that they are out there, somewhere, collecting together secretly to impose punishment for transgressions, comes over you like a wet blanket.

Who they are, and where they might be, is beyond the common resident. Unless you are a part of them, you simply do not know who they are, where they live, or what they intend to do at any given time. They have always been known to appear out of nowhere, mass together to inflict some social disorder, and then disappear as quickly as they came. To the outside observer, they seem to have a collective magical power.

I first heard the myths surrounding the Klan as a child on my parent's farm in Bowling Green, Kentucky. My father had bought the place in 1974, and went into business as a small part time farmer. Because there was so much work to be done, he hired numerous seasonal workers to put up fences, level ground, and harvest the various crops that we grew each year. It was from these locals, mostly ex-convicts that I acquired much of my working knowledge about my community, particularly the Klan.

Charles, a thirty year old worker and his brother were there one hot summer day relaxing after our noon lunch break. We were sitting under two large cedar trees just off the back part of the main house. They had been employees of my father for as long as I could remember, and were a couple of my favorites. I didn't mind at all that they were a little slow. It was that disability which prevented them from holding a decent paying job for any length of time, making farm work their most stable profession.

We had finished eating our bologna sandwiches, washing them down with lemonade when Charlie and his brother began talking about the Klan. How the subject was brought up, I can't recall. I think it must have been some event involving the KKK, perhaps, with hindsight, a march or rally. Instantly my ears perked up, this was something that always had my attention even at seven years of age. I paid close attention to everything any adult said around me. In fact, at that age, a seven year old couldn't wait to grow up and become an adult who had all this vast knowledge they shared so freely around me.

"Remember when they hung them three niggers down't Russellville," Charlie said to his brother. "They wuz messin' with them white girls, an' didn't stop when they was told to." "Hung 'em in the yard, didn't they?" his brother said. "Yep, All three of 'em. Musta been, around sixty-three or so", Charlie replied. "That's what I'm a-thinkin'. Ain't been no niggers fooling' with any white girls down there since, I knowed of," said his brother.

"There wuz a bunch of 'em round here too. Cept ain't nobody knows who they is. Some of 'em is lawyers, doctors, even judges. I reckin' all the damn law is Klan," Charlie continued.

I knew where Russellville was. My dad had driven me all over the area. He was in construction and would take me with him on some of his excavation job sites. Whenever I rode with him to Russellville I would ask him how long it was going to take to get there, and he would answer me in minutes, so I figured it was probably about thirty minutes away from our farm.

I had never given any thought to interracial relations, or the Klan, and I had never considered that the important people in our town were members. Like others, I had seen the movies which showed the Klan burning houses and lighting crosses. At seven years old, I had believed the Klan lived in the deep South which to me was on the other side of the world, not in the same place I lived. Charlie and his brother said they lived here, right here, and that left me with an uneasy feeling, a prelude to my future.

Years went by and we all grew up. Through these years I would often hear more and more about the Klan. It was just a little here and a little there, like, "hey did you know that his dad is in the KKK", or "I saw him going down that road where the KKK go", but you didn't really know if the rumors were true or not. It was those type of rumors, together with sketchy history taught in school that gave me the mythical impression of the KKK.

Looking back, I believe the impression I had was the result of what I believed to be "white guilt." All the history classes I had taken in school mysteriously omitted discussions of the KKK, treating it like a blemish on our past which should be forgotten, not studied. From this result, my education about this group came solely from rumors and backyard stories. I never found the truth about the KKK and was forced to accept the stories. I know now that even the black children knew about as much as I did about them and our lessons were taught to us in the wrong way.

Teaching of the KKK was an error in the school curriculum and hopefully my writing of this book will be a helpful cure. To allow our young to be drawn to a mystery, or in the case of black children, to be taught to hate all whites as probable Klan is disastrous. This farce is only because we are too ashamed of our past to talk about it, and it makes our lives a travesty. There is no doubt in my mind that the collective guilt of the white society in which I was raised kept the Klan a hidden, dark secret. I believe this contributed greatly to the lure of the KKK. Had I been taught the truth about the KKK in school, I might not be telling this story now.

Generally speaking, not many people are members of the KKK. Not in my community and not in this country. While there are some political and civil servant members, their numbers are not as great as the rumors would have one to believe. Do they wield power? Are they a force to beware of? Not as a group of members of the Klan are they a force, but only as a set of beliefs among the uneducated, poor, country whites and blacks are they powerful. These beliefs about the meaning of history and the meaning of racial differences are a serious force in our society that have produced, beyond any reasonable doubt, some of the grossest tragedies in our recent history. It is time we made a concerted effort to deal with this problem in a structured, well reasoned manner. Before any of us can do that, we must be truthful; first to ourselves and then to the world at large.

If we have been programmed to hate by sketchy history and rumor, we need to admit that. If we have learned to hate because of the way we have been treated, or because of what we have been told, we need to admit that as well; as politically incorrect as it seems. Until we learn to admit the truth, we can go no further down the road of knowledge.

My story really begins with the Imperial Wizard of the local chapter of the KKK, called the "Kentucky Knights of the Ku Klux Klan." I had the misfortune of being introduced to that organization directly by him. In other words, I was brought in at the top. Maybe that is what makes my story so odd.

Chapter Two

Bowling Green, Kentucky sits about twenty miles north of the Tennessee- Kentucky state line, half-way across the state. It is not far from the birth place of Jefferson Davis, the father of the Confederacy. In 1990, the population was 41,688 with the major industry being farming, mostly cattle farming. There are several factories including the famous General Motors Corvette Plant which employ several thousand. Bowling Green is the largest city within a sixty-mile radius.

The city itself is an example of urban sprawl. There are no high rises, (city hall, the jail and the federal courthouse all share the same downtown block). The growth has always been in the suburbs.

To the Northeast and west runs the Barren River. Only two bridges cross it, forcing most of the expansion in the other three directions. Within a few miles to the west, a ridge of hills begin and rise up to a thousand feet or so. Towards the east the land is rolling and has supported the brunt of the expanding population and the commercial growth.

My family moved to Bowling Green in 1970. After working a few years in the service station business, my dad bought a backhoe and went into excavating. By the time I was in the second grade, I was riding along on the equipment with him, learning how to do all types of excavation and to operate backhoes, bull dozers and to drive dump trucks.

By the time I was seventeen, I began working as a foreman for Valley Construction, a one-horse construction company owned by a local doctor. We had a dump truck, backhoe, small dozer, and a trailer. We advertised in the newspaper to do custom excavating, including land clearing, septic tank installation and anything else that required digging or grading. I had a pager and the doctor supplied a blue Ford Ranger four-wheel drive pickup for my transportation. It was a fantastic opportunity for me at that age. I was more a partner than a foreman, and possessed complete discretion in obtaining jobs and pricing them; as well as the unfettered power to hire and fire employees. I would respond to customer calls, bid jobs, move equipment, hire and supervise employees to perform the work to the customer's satisfaction and then collect the money - all with no oversight whatsoever. I didn't have a salary as such, just a share of the net proceeds - whatever share I thought I deserved. It was a job which would bring me face-to-face with the Ku Klux Klan.

On a warm Spring day in 1988, I received a call to meet a man at a small townhouse in the city to haul off some old roofing. When I arrived, an old man was standing out front next to a black, four-wheel drive Chevrolet pickup truck. He was short and thin with a weathered face and a dark tan. He was wearing work boots, jeans, a ball cap with a frayed bill, and a dark t-shirt, one small pocket on the upper left side full of folded papers as well as an ink pen or two. He looked like any other carpenter I had been in contact with. In front of the garage, I could see a car sized pile of old roofing.

"Afternoon sir," I said as I exited my truck. "I'm the man you spoke to on the phone." The old man eyed me keenly. "Reckon' you can haul this stuff off for me?" he asked without further introduction. I walked over to the pile and took a closer look. It was filled with nails. I would have to be careful because any nail in a tire would cost me any profit I could hope to make on the job. "When you want it done?"

"How much you charge?" And that's the way it always went. Everyone wanted to know how much before anything else. I don't know how people do business in other places, but in Kentucky, the bottom line comes first, followed by the bullshit.

"I'll need a three-hour minimum for the truck and backhoe, but the job will be done in an hour or so. I'll do it for one hundred and fifty dollars, that's a sixty dollar break," I answered. What the hell, I needed the work and it was an easy job. He said yes, and we agreed that I would do it the next day while he was still putting on the new roof.

The next afternoon, I finished the job and waited to see the old man for my money. He walked up to me and asked if a check was okay with me. "I'd rather have cash, but if that's all you got," I replied. Sometimes personal checks bounced and I didn't want the hassle of having to collect.

"Can you come up to my house later? I can run over to the bank and get cash and meet you back there", he offered. That was fine with me. If I had taken the check and cashed it myself, who knows? I might not have seen that old man again.

It was after dark when I arrived at the old man's house after dropping off my equipment and taking my employee home. As I pulled in, my headlights shown over old cars, tractors, trucks, and miscellaneous farm equipment parked in a grassy field on the left side of the drive. To my right, I could make out a large yard with a couple of oak trees. The most conspicuous thing about the place was a large pond which lay between the house and the road. His place lay atop a hill from which the city of Bowling Green was clearly visible and I could see the city lights as I turned and idled toward the house. A dog which could have passed for a small brown bear appeared. I hadn't seen him and now he was trying to take off my front tire. I turned off my engine and lights while the dog patiently waited by my door, salivating. I honked my horn.

The old man came out, called something to the dog which prompted it to disappear behind the house, and began to walk out. I rolled down my window and the smell of frying food filled the air. "Come on in. The old lady has dinner ready," he said as he approached my door.

We walked probably a hundred yards from where I was parked and stepped up on the front porch. We entered through a wooden front door and looking down, I could see that the flooring was wood also. To my left sat an old wood stove and on my right, I could see a couch and chair arranged in an "L" shape along the wall. Standing as if the room had been built around it, was a podium. I had seen them in school, but seeing one in a house was a different story. Still observing my surroundings, I noticed that next to the podium, hidden partially by a chair, was a large square wooden table. Glancing around the room again, I realized that I was standing in a ready made meeting hall. Through an opening to my left, directly across from the stove, I could see a kitchen and in it was another square wooden table. It was covered with a white tablecloth and several bowls of food.

Walking towards the kitchen with the aroma of food filling my nostrils, I realized that there was a lot of food for just a few people. In fact, the food could have fed about ten or more. "Hope you found the place all right", the old man said as we were going through the door. I didn't expect to eat here, so I tried to turn down the silent offer. The old man wouldn't hear of it and explained that he had another job he wanted to talk to me about and figured that we could do it during dinner. Laughing, he patted his shirt pocket and said, "I've got your money right here". Nodding in acknowledgement, I figured that even though I was going to have to eat, I wanted to hear what he had to say. Work was slow and if being his guest at dinner would get more work, then it was worth my time.

We sat down at the table and I realized the old man had planned this in advance. There was a place already set for a third person and since it was just he and his wife and now me, I was somewhat puzzled. Regardless of the feeling that was going through my mind at the time, I figured having me to dinner meant he wanted to try and get me as cheap as possible on the new job he was going to talk about.

He began by explaining that his pond out front needed to be somewhat deeper, and the cattails growing inside needed to be dug out. I didn't remember seeing any cattails earlier and continued to listen about how he wanted it done. I explained that I could probably do the job and we continued eating our dinner. The fried meat had a different taste than what I was use to, but the flavor was a good one and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I agreed to drive back up the next day and look over the job he needed done and meet him later to discuss the pricing. He said that he would be in town working on a house and to look him up at home later that evening. He never asked where I lived or my name. I felt obliged not to question him the same. On my drive home I thought about the man I had just met. Who was he and what was a poor old carpenter doing with a podium in his living room?

The next morning I drove back out to the old man's, parked on the road leading to his house and looked out over the pond. Like so many roads in Warren County, it was a lightly traveled blacktop road. Anyone who drove up could go around my truck with ease.

Looking toward the old man's house I saw the dog which could pass for a brown bear. I didn't feel like trying the damn dog and he didn't look too eager to come down to the road. He appeared to be content to sit on the opposite bank and watch me. Technically, I wasn't in his territory.

The pond was, at one time, nearly an acre. Now it had largely filled with mud and cattails so that there were gently sloping banks of mud running into a small, probably shallow, pool of brown water. The old man said there were some man eating catfish in it, and that he wanted to save them. To drain the water, push the mud out and shape the banks would take several days and I wondered whether the old man could afford it.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Inside the Klu Klux Klanby Brian Tackett Copyright © 2009 by Brian Tackett. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.