query and update

[bronze_ribbons]

My search skillz having failed me, I turn to the all-knowing readership: rumor has it that one of the co-founders of the KKK was a Unitarian. What was his name? (And, as long as I'm asking, what's your source? This detail is apparently a longstanding item of UU lore in some circles, and I'd like to verify whether it's actually true before I go repeating it.)

Update:
* Still the crud. It's apparently only bronchitis (went in for x-rays yesterday to confirm), but it's literally tiresome and I'm hoping this new batch of meds gets it gone.
* Also insomnia, but as a result, this Sunday's sermon is nearly finished. Go me!
* Claire Huchet Bishop's Twenty and Ten (1952). 76 pages, ages 8-12. Twenty French children help ten Jewish ones hide from the Nazis. Surprisingly fitting for this season.
* Asparagus on sale! Roasted the spears and made soup out of the snap-offs.
* Finished a gift I'd been meaning to pull together since July.
* Hundreds of pages to go before I sleep. Onwards...

Comments

[schemingreader.livejournal.com]

Husband asks immediately:

When you say founder of the KKK, do you mean the original turn of the century KKK or of the new KKK groups that were founded in response to Freedom Summer? There is some overlap, which makes things confusing, but the White Knights of MS, for example, which is the group that murdered Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner, was founded in 1964. And there were different Klan groups in different states even before that. Anyway, you get my drift: to research the claim we first have to establish which Klan group and which period we are talking about.

(aside: he didn't use to be so savvy about history! He's like a real historian now! Squee!)

[schemingreader.livejournal.com]

(Also, and he doesn't mention this, there was a revival of the KKK in the 1920s in response to the movie Birth of a Nation, and that revival might have had a Unitarian or two in it. So we're talking about waves of activity, and "founder" might not help you figure it out.)

[mechaieh.livejournal.com]

What an awesome question (not that there were multiple instances, but that he can point out those distinctions to me). Unfortunately, I've no idea, since all I've got to go on right now are some stray mentions in other people's blog comments and sermons.

BTW, please don't feel he/you have to chase after this (unless you/he just feel like it for the fun of it) -- at this point, it's just one of those idle questions in the corner of my brain (akin to who the Brasington of Brasington's Ninth Law happens to be, why Mike Gwilym stopped acting, etc.) that I don't really have time to chase down properly. I might just ask my choir director next time I see him, come to think of it...

[schemingreader.livejournal.com]

Whoops, deleted my comment because I accidentally used my husband's first name. Sorry.