KKK Rallies in Glendale in 1924

The Ku Klux Klan had its origins in the south after the American Civil War, a reaction against northern governance. But it had a resurgence on a broader scale in the 1920s. It was surprisingly kicked off by Hollywood with the 1915 release of the immensely popular film “Birth of a Nation” by director D. W. Griffith. The overtly racist film glorified the Ku Klux Klan of the post-Civil War era and inspired the formation of a new Ku Klux Klan. The White supremist group was popular not only in the southern states but in the north and the western states as well. Glendale had its own chapter of the KKK (called a “klavern”) with thousands of members. In the summer of 1924, 100 years ago, it organized a huge two-day rally that included other klaverns from the Los Angeles area.

On July 12, 1924 thousands of Klansmen gathered in Verdugo Park for a picnic followed by baseball games between the various Los Angeles area klaverns. At twilight the Klansmen gathered at the south end of Brand Boulevard for a dramatic nighttime parade. Preceded by Klansmen on horseback and Klansmen carrying a fiery cross, columns of white-robed men and women marched, their arms folded and eyes straight ahead. The column continued into the hills above Glendale (possibly the Rossmoyne neighborhood or the hills behind Glendale College) to gather for a solemn ceremony. They were followed by thousands of spectators. The crowd gathered around two pre-positioned spotlights.

The song “America The Beautiful” was played by the Klan’s own band, followed by a Klan anthem. Then four hooded Klansmen carried the American flag to a huge cross, which burst into flame. Hundreds of Klansmen marched to the flag and cross singing “Onward Christian Soldiers” and formed a huge square. In the center was an altar on which stood the “Nighthawk,” a black-robed Klansman, who along with the head Klansman, called the “Grand Cyclops,” conducted a ritual to admit new members to the Klan. Three hundred “worthy aliens” (those seeking “citizenship in the Invisible Empire”) came forward and swore their obligation “to God, their government and their fellow Klansmen.” This ended the ritual.

The following day, the thousands of Klansmen gathered for a lecture by a prominent Los Angeles minister and that night they visited several Glendale churches.

A Glendale newspaper, in what I hope was just an opinion piece, lauded the KKK, calling the members the “white-clad knights of liberty.” It further named the KKK as “ardent supporters of the law and order, based on the belief that Caucasian American stock should be the dominating power in the United States.”

Two months later, Leslie Brand hosted a second rally at his private airport in front of his house (today’s Brand Library). In September 1924, 3,000 white-robed members of the Glendale Klavern gathered at Central and Colorado in downtown Glendale for another nighttime march up Brand Boulevard. They were preceded by a squad carrying the American flag and they sang “Onward Christian Soldiers” as they marched. When they reached the top of Brand they piled into cars for the ride over to Brand’s estate.

There, under a flaming cross and two bright searchlights, 350 “worthy aliens” were initiated into the Klan while a massive crowd of 15,000 Glendalians looked on. A center altar displayed the seven symbols of the Ku Klux Klan: the Bible, the fiery cross, the American flag, an unsheathed sword, an urn of water, a Klansman’s robe, and the white Klan hood. The ceremony wrapped up with the singing of the “Star Spangled Banner.”

In the mid-20s, the KKK was very popular across the U.S., with an estimated membership of up to 8 million. But the KKK began to splinter with internal divisions by the late 1920s. That, along with a highly publicized 1925 conviction of a Klan leader for a brutal rape and murder, caused the KKK to fade away in the 1930s, both in the U.S. and in Glendale.