Stateline 1103 Master Script

BOOTH

FOR MOST OF RECORDED HISTORY SOME PEOPLE HAVE TREATED OTHER PEOPLE DIFFERENTLY BECAUSE OF THEIR APPEARANCE OR THEIR ETHNICITY.

BUT A DISTINCTLY AMERICAN ORGANIZATION IS ALMOST UNIVERSALLY RECOGNIZED AS THE PINNACLE OF DISCRIMINATION.  THE KU KLUX KLAN WAS FOUNDED IN TENNESSEE IN THE POST-CIVIL-WAR PERIOD FOR THE PURPOSE OF RESISTING RECONSTRUCTION BY INTIMIDATING, ASSAULTING, AND MURDERING, FREE BLACKS AND WHITE REPUBLICANS.

HATE CAME TO OKLAHOMA WITH SOUTHERN SETTLERS IN THE LATE 19TH CENTURY.

18:03:11:22

CURRIE BALLARD:  "various white hate groups. Had infiltrated, had come here to make a new life for themselves but they brought that horrible baggage of racism, predjudice. So Oklahoma so the roots and the foundation of the Ku Klux Klan in this State go all the way back to territorial time."

BOOTH

THE KLAN'S INFLUENCE IN OKLAHOMA GREW THROUGH THE EARLY YEARS OF STATEHOOD AND IT FOUND OTHER PEOPLE TO HATE, AMERICAN INDIANS, CATHOLICS, JEWS, UNION MEMBERS, IMMIGRANTS.  AND AT THE HEIGHT OF ITS POWER IT TOOK ON GOVERNOR JACK WALTON.

11:49:04:20

BOB BURKE:  "secretly many members of the Oklahoma Legislature were members of the Klan. Leadership of the two major counties in the state were members of the Klan. So the Klan declared war on Jack Walton."

BOOTH

HE BECAME THE FIRST OKLAHOMA GOVERNOR TO BE IMPEACHED AND SERVED JUST NINE MONTHS IN OFFICE.

ON THIS STATELINE HISTORY SPECIAL, THE STORY OF JACK WALTON'S WAR, AND OF A CULTURE OF RACISM THAT EXISTS TO A DEGREE TO THIS DAY.  THE STORY OF OKLAHOMA'S INVISIBLE EMPIRE.

TRT

Bob Burke

12:03:55:15     C0002

If you were a defendant in a racially flared case and all at once you were in your home and you hear a clamor outside your home at midnight...and you look outside and there's a burning cross on your doorstep or in your yard. And all at once your door is bashed in and here comes a number of hooded figures who come in with guns, maybe without guns, but certainly with clubs and beat you and if they didn't beat you to death you might be found hanging the next morning under some tree in your yard.

Carter Blue Clark

12;27;29;06      C0002

It is very hard to pin point to who has done what under the cover and protection of darkness.

When Oklahoma was a lawless territory the Ku Klux Klan appointed itself judge, jury and executioner. In many parts of the state the Klan had a free hand and terrorized entire communities using the torch, the whip and the noose. The eyes behind the hood did not belong to monsters they were men, and often they were the most prominent men in the community.

Bob Burke

11:25:06:29       C0002

The Klan really got a foothold in Oklahoma because of Oklahoma City and Tulsa growing so fast. For example, Oklahoma City from 1910 to 1920 had a 50% to 60% increase in population...didn't have enough lawmen to take care of all the crime.

Carter Blue Clark

12;32;56;13    C0002

There was an explosion of corrective night time behavior. By masked or hooded individuals. The Klan itself took public accolades and made claims that it itself had single handedly cleaned up many oil camps.

Bob Burke

11:25:06:29       C0002

the KKK got a foothold...and began forming beating squads, began forming vigilante groups that would go downtown and beat up on prostitutes, beat up on pimps, beat up on someone selling drugs.

Blue Clark

09; 12;53;23;13    C0002

There were many immigrants in the Oil fields and mining camps of eastern Oklahoma at the time.

Jim Showalter

16;34;56;19   C0016     S-201

You can say that their big enemies were the Catholics, Jews, radicals in general...and the protection of white womanhood.

Jim Showalter

16:42:09:10    C0016    S-402

One of the most common things the Klan would do is a "church visit." Suddenly the doors would fly open and in would march a bunch of Klansmen in full regalia and they would line the aisles'. And one man would go to the front, interrupt the sermon and make a little speech about how wonderful this preacher has been and hand him a check and then march out silently. And everybody would look at their shoes to see who they really were because everybody had one pair of shoes and you could tell who they were from that.

Carter Blue Clark

13;16;04;19       C0005

The early recruiter of the Klan who came from Texas would first go to a major city. Tulsa or Oklahoma City and then approach the leading officials...Sheriff, police chief, Mayor.

Jim Showalter

16:59:33:28   C0017    S-402

Klansmen were just your neighbors, Klansmen were your insurance agent, Klansmen were your minister, and Klansmen was whatever...he could also be somebody who dug ditches.

Jim Showalter

17:01:07:22   C0017    S-402

These people, they were joining what they thought was a good organization. They thought it might be a little exciting.

Jim Showalter

16;35;22;25  C0016     S-201

He went to the barber shop, he went to the gatherings, and he went to the conservative ministers in town. Talked to them, "what's this town afraid of?" And then zip to the top of the list that is what the Klan is about.

Jim Showalter

16;35;55;14    C0016    S-201

So you go into a little town...well I will name one, Enid. The top of the list was race. They say sixty cars I think It was less than that, suddenly appeared in 1921 going around in the black section of town with Klan in full regalia looking for 25 individuals to hand them letters to tell them to get their rears out of Enid in 24 hours.

Jim Showalter

17:02:12:19    C0017    S-201

The day after the Klan delivered its messages; there was turmoil down on 2 street...the black area of town.

Jim Showalter

17:02:31:01          S-201       C0017

And a large number of people, both the blacks threatened and others left town.

Larry O'Dell

09;34;58;21        C0003

There would be signs in the store saying "Klan welcome" or the Klan should buy here. The politicians even several of the state legislatures were in the Klan.

Carter Blue Clark

13;15;26;08    C0005

State wide it was estimated and I think an accurate estimate was about 10% of the population at one time or another were members of the Klan.

Bob Burke

11:32:32:08     C0002

There were many who wanted to make Oklahoma an all black state, there were others that did not want blacks to have a vote. President Theodore Roosevelt as a condition of Oklahoma becoming a state said "You can not deny Negros the right to vote."

Larry O'Dell

10;06;24;06    C0003

The very first law passed by the Oklahoma legislature after Statehood was Senate Bill number one. Which separated the train stations in Oklahoma, there was an area for whites there was an area for blacks. Jim Crow laws were segregation laws.

Curry Ballard

18;09;32;07     C0001

It wasn't the tenth law passed in the state, it wasn't the fifth law passed in the brand new state of Oklahoma. The very first law placed on the books was the Jim Crow segregation laws. Does that tell you where you stand in the scheme of things as an African American?

Jim Showalter

16:55:40:01     C0001

It was something that got almost from their mother's milk, that whites were superior to blacks, blacks had a place, ect. And the laws reflected that.

Bob Burke

11:27:31:25    C0002

The Oklahoma Klan Unit #1 in Oklahoma City had a vigilante squad called the San Hedron that was named after the court that punished Jesus Christ. And their job was to assist law enforcement, to find somebody that they thought was guilty of crime.

Larry O'Dell

09;32;47;01      C0003

There were more whites, not many times, There were probably more whites punished then there where any other minority. Because they saw themselves as keeping the moral standards high.

Carter Blue Clark

12;31;40;21       C0002

They would tie the individual, male or female, usually male to a post, a whipping post or tree, and then whipped them. Either facing or on the back.

Curry Ballard

18;27;11;00     C0001

Well terror is right terror, terrorism, you know if your home and your community is not the safe haven or your church is not the safe haven...then you have none.

Bob Burke

12:00:26:04      C0002

Shortly after statehood, Oklahoma was plagued with a number of racially motivated lynchings.

Larry O'Dell

10;25;13;21      C0003

The most common would be that they would be accused of rape...rape of a white woman.

Curry Ballard

18;07;21;22     C0001

Even the tentacles of hate as far as lynching affected directly my family, and I am talking now four generations from that point.

Curry Ballard

18;08;07;09     C0001

Your family is never the same, your husband lynched your brother lynched your father lynched because of the color of their skin and being prosperous in a small farm community. It is devastating.

Carter Blue Clark

13;23;57;18      C0005

This State ranked approximately 11th in historic numbers of lynchings within States of the United States. There are about 141 that are known incidents of lynchings.

Curry Ballard

18;28;57;22       C0001

Okemah which was right next too the all black town of Boley. Allegedly this black male supposedly sexually accosted a white female. Well any way the town's people gather a lynch mob. Let's just tell it like it is a lynch mob gathered, and they literally chased this boy back to his home. Again he is trying to find a refuge. Not only that they capture the boy. They capture the mother, and one of the rare instances that took place in this country. They hung the mother as well.

Carter Blue Clark

13;24;25;04       C0005

It could be a mass public event in which large, large crowds would come to observe.

Carter Blue Clark

13;26;35;14       C0005

...With people selling ices and bottled sodas on a hot day, or evening.

Curry Ballard

18;30;27;29   C0001

Durant. I think it was 1911. Again another accusation of a black male accosting a white women. The literally beat him almost unconscious. He is on a board, He is stretched out on a board. Town's people take a photograph with this person. And then the caption on the picture post card "Coon Cooking."

Curry Ballard

18;31;30;00   C0001

And they burnt this man alive and then they...dozens and dozens of people that turned out to see this happen. When I look at that. Every time I look at that photograph I say where were these people come Sunday morning?

Decades of violence culminated in the biggest race riot in American history on June 1^st, 1921 in the Greenwood district of north Tulsa.

Carter Blue Clark

12;56;06;25     C0002

Greenwood district was a model of prosperity for African Americans with in America and with in this State. It was a large more than twelve block region of prosperous African American businesses of all kinds.

Jim Showalter

17:56:49:09   C0017    S-402

Tulsa was known as "The Black Wall Street." Very prosperous. And in fact some people say that the riot was in part because of the prosperity of the blacks in the town.

Larry O'Dell

09;50;18;22    C0003

The main trigger point was a young African American named Dick Roland being accused of assaulting a white girl in downtown Tulsa. He was in Jail. African Americans from the Greenwood district. / Decided they weren't going to allow a lynching to happen in their town. They went downtown to confront the crowds. The crowds confronted them and it just escalated until a full scale riot.

Carter Blue Clark

12;54;51;20       C0002

Armed groups even using rapid fire weapons mounted on trucks and went through the streets.

Carter Blue Clark

13;06;20;11    C0004

Blacks had been forced, literally, forced from their homes and watched their homes torched by white roving bands of rioters.

Larry O'Dell

09;50;18;22    C0003

35 square blocks were just destroyed in the black community.

Bob Burke

11:45:01:17    C0002

It takes a couple of days for everything to burn to the ground. But from the embers, from the embers arise at least a temporary peace. It took decades for the hard feelings to go away.

No one was ever prosecuted for taking part in the riot and no official count was ever made of how many people were killed. Estimates range from 60 to 600.

Curry Ballard

18;22;55;28     S-205    C0001

You talk about a stain on a states history. That is terrorism at its height and glory. That is all it could be ever called terrorism at its height and glory. Where innocent men, women, and children were literally slaughtered.

Larry O'Dell

09;40;01;08    C0003

After the 1921 race riot Tulsa almost used that as a recruiting tool. It was one of the largest Klan membership cities in Oklahoma.

In 1923 Oklahomans elected a man the papers called "Iron Jack Walton.

Bob Burke

11:50:16:25    C0002

Jack Walton in his mind in the spring of 1923 feels like that he is an all powerful Governor. He'd been a well respected Commissioner of Public Works and Mayor of Oklahoma City / But power almost goes to his head.

Responding to reports of Klan violence in the boomtowns, Jack Walton declared martial law in Okmulgee County.

Bob Burke

11:52:42:22    C0002

Governor Walton did not believe that the local Sheriff could simply enforce the law in Okmulgee County. So he declares martial law, sends in the National Guard and takes over the local Sheriff's office.

Carter Blue Clark

12;43;39;26    C0002

...and once you call out the militia it is easy to turn up their heat, and keep calling it out.

Bob Burke

11:35:56:18    C0002

That's evidenced by the fact that in 1923 Governor Jack Walton declared martial law in Tulsa County. There was so much Klan activity he set up a military court to receive complaints about Klan activity. More than 700 complaints, 700 people filed before that military court and made complaints about activity in Tulsa county of KKK activity.

Bob Burke

11:54:09:17    C0002

Accusing the KKK of beating them, of killing their friends and neighbors, and obviously most of the complainants were from the blacks of north Tulsa.

Walton went so far as to tell citizens...if you kill a Klansman, I'll pardon you.

Bob Burke

11:49:04:20    C0002

But it destroyed him. The reason was that secretly many members of the Oklahoma Legislature were members of the Klan. Leadership of the two major counties in the state were members of the Klan. So the Klan declared war on Jack Walton.

By the summer of 1923 Klan members in the legislature had had enough and moved to impeach Jack Walton. But he would not go without a fight, Walton expanded martial law statewide and ordered the militia to erect machine gun nests around the capitol to prevent lawmakers from meeting there. They did meet, at the Huckins Hotel in downtown Oklahoma City. There they wrote an end to Walton's political career.

Larry O'Dell

09;46;13;11    C0003

Governor Walton was impeached unanimously all the charges were non Klan related, because they wanted to keep the Klan out of it, it was a political hot bed. They didn't want Walton to bring any of the Klan Issues into the impeachment trials.

Carter Blue Clark

12;48;16;23       C0002

He was finally convicted on eleven counts, corruption, miss use of power and selling pardons and paroles.

Bob Burke

11:50:00:26    C0002

So he served less than nine months in office.

Curry Ballard

18;20;19;17     C0001

This was a democrat that took on the Klan, so a white democrat. Well you know what prize he ended up getting it wasn't the Nobel peace it was Impeachment. He was literally run out of office.

Jim Showalter

16:45:02:10    C0016    S-402

When Walton was finally impeached it looked like the Klan had won, but immediately there were some anti-Klan laws proposed. You could only wear a mask at Halloween in public.

Carter Blue Clark

12;37;40;29     C0002

This was by a legislature dominated by Klan members. They were under the hot glare of public viewing and they felt that they had no other alternative.

Curry Ballard

18;34;27;16    C0001

You know whenever a person stands up for right. Politically he had nothing to gain. On standing up against the Klan. As a matter of fact it cost him his political career. It ended it. I don't know where Gov. Walton is buried but where ever he is buried he needs a wreath of honor.

Jim Showalter

16:47:57:13   C0017    S-402

We think that the Klan peaked in Oklahoma like it peaked nationally in about '23, and it had a rather precipitous decline / after that.

Bob Burke

12:09:23:16    C0002

All at once the great depression comes along and the dust storms, and the horrible economic downturn.

Bob Burke

12:10:31:23    C0002

The important thing to do was get a job, stay alive, feed your family. No longer did you have a lot of time on your hands to become part of some KKK activity, you had more important things like survival.

Jim Showalter

17:06:09:20   C0017    S-402

I think the decline was that people got tired of marching around and not doing much.

Larry O'Dell

10;00;49;17    C0003

The Klan as been around in Oklahoma since then but it hasn't had any significant power since 1928 or '29.

Aside from a small spike in activity during the 1960's civil rights movement, Oklahoma membership in the Klan dwindled but it never went away.

Johnny Lee Clary

14;28;21;01    C0010

Into the 1970's and into the 80's. The Ku Klux Klan grew in numbers in Oklahoma, I do know that there was always about a thousand people during that time that belonged to the Klan.

Johnny Lee Clary was once the Imperial Wizard, the national leader of the Ku Klux Klan. He grew up in Del City, moved to California, joined the Klan and brought it back to his home.

Johnny Lee

14;21;38;27    C0008

I actually became the State leader of the Ku Klux Klan in 1979.

Johnny Lee Clary

14;01;55;14     C0008

Then we started initiating high school recruitment programs and things like that.

Johnnie Lee Clary

14;03;53;21     C0008

What they do is they look for where there is racial trouble and they go cash in on it. For instance in I think it was January of 1980. The town of Idabel, Oklahoma had a race riot. So the Ku Klux Klan we went down there. We see there is a race riot it is a great place to come and sign up members. So the Klan we would go to places there was trouble like Idabel.

Today experts say there are about five Klan groups located in Oklahoma. The current state leaders, who did not want to be identified...say today's Klan has left hate and violence behind.

"A-K"

15;42;55;01    C0001

We don't go out looking for trouble because of race or whatever. We don't go pick fights or anything like that. We are...I don't know how to put it. But we are not a violent group.

"Stonewall"

16;01;24;14   C0002

White separatism appeals to me. Standing up for our white rights. Keeping out Mexican immigrants, and other ones like that.

"A-K"

15;43;36;29    C0001

We like the tea parties they had. We go out and march in them. We write our congressmen and voice our opinions. We have our monthly meetings here and there.

When the Klan looks for new members it looks first for those in authority, members that can bring power into the group.

Johnnie Lee Clary

14;19;48;01        C0008

I started recruiting people around the Del City Midwest City area. And Oklahoma City and I started signing up police officers because I said we need the police on our side.

Johnnie Lee Clary

14;24;51;06      C0008

Under my leadership I was able to establish Klaverns in a lot of the smaller towns. I went statewide with it. I had one at Newcastle, I had the Newcastle, Blanchard Klavern. I had the Tulsa Klavern. I wasn't just Tulsa and Oklahoma City any more. I Had Idabel, McCurtain County Ku Klux Klan you know. I had a Klan down in the Chickasaw Anadarko area.

"A-K"

15;47;55;23       C0001

We are pretty much all over the state. I can't give you no numbers, but no not really all I can say is we are here. We are everywhere I guess you might say. We are in your police forces. You fire mens, schools, you know just different places. We are everywhere.

"Stonewall"

16;09;33;23      C0002

I see the Klan is going to get a lot bigger I see people that is dissatisfied with the economy and the government.

"A-K"

15;54;02;21      C0001

We are looking for full blood American people. People who believe in the constitution of the United States. Who wants to fight for our rights. That's who we are looking for.

According to the FBI the Klan is the experiencing a major resurgence nation wide.

"A-K"

15;47;33;16      C0001

When 9/11 happened we had a big boom in recruitment. Then when Obama got elected we had even much bigger recruitments.

"Stonewall"

16;03;48;15      C0002

I do see a lot more members coming in. It is building up slowly.

Johnny Lee Clary quit the Klan in 1989 and now preaches all over the world against hate groups.

Johnnie Lee Clary

14;10;33;17    C0008

The Klan is a gang. They are nothing more than a street gang like the Crips or the Bloods or the MS-13.

Clary calls hate a cancer that can only be treated with education and understanding.

Curry Ballard

18;33;24;26    C0001

I love Oklahoma would not live in any other state. But I am here to tell you we have got a history of hatred horror and nightmarish actions when it comes to race relations.

Bob Burke

12:16:47:03     C0003

Had the officials strongly in the 1920's said "We are Oklahoma, we're going to abide by the rule of law, and we're not going to let some fraternal organization take the law into its own hands and violate every possible constitutional right that our citizens enjoy."

Carter Blue Clark

13;42;06;00    C0005

All of those activities took place in Oklahoma or Indian Territory very rapidly. And it takes some time for people in the State to adjust to those very rapid changes. So that over time the mistakes of the past have been learned and I hope have been learned well.

TRT

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HISTORIANS RECOGNIZE THREE DISTINCT PHASES OF KLAN ACTIVITY.  WHAT THEY CALL THE FIRST KLAN WAS FOUNDED BY CONFEDERATE VETERANS JUST AFTER THE CIVIL WAR.

THE SECOND KLAN WAS A RESURGENCE OF ACTIVITY FOLLOWING THE 1915 RELEASE OF A FILM CALLED "BIRTH OF A NATION," WHICH GLORIFIED THE ACTIVITIES OF THE FIRST KLAN.

LATER KLANS, FROM THE 1950S THROUGH THE PRESENT, WERE FORMED TO RESIST THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT.

CURRENT MEMBERSHIP IN THE UNITED STATES IS ESTIMATED AT AROUND SIX THOUSAND, A FAR CRY FROM THE SIX MILLION RECORDED IN 1924, AT THE HEIGHT OF THE INVISIBLE EMPIRE.