History of the Ku Klux Klan in New Jersey

Pro Klan, anti Roman Catholic cartoon by Branford Clarke published in Heroes of the Fiery Cross by the Pillar of Fire Church in Zarephath, New Jersey

Branford Clarke illustration supporting the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

The Ku Klux Klan has had a history in the U.S. state of New Jersey since the early part of the 1920s. The Klan was active in the areas of Trenton and Camden and had a presence in several of the state's northern counties in the 1920s. It had the most members in Monmouth County, and operated a resort at Wall Township's Camp Evans.

History

The first local chapter of the KKK in New Jersey was organized in 1921, after units had started in New York and Pennsylvania. Arthur Hornbui Bell was the state's first Grand Dragon, and continued serving in that post until the Ku Klux Klan was disbanded in 1944.

As early as 1922, the New Jersey Klan protested Paterson, New Jersey's honored burial of the Roman Catholic priest William N. McNulty, which closed schools during his funeral. They argued it was a breach of the U.S. legal doctrine of separation of church and state. Mayor Frank J. Van Noort ordered the honors for the respected dean of a major church.

In 1922 George W. Apgar was the King Kleagle, with state headquarters based just outside Newark.

In 1923, the Klan provided funding to the Pillar of Fire Church to found Alma White College in Zarephath, New Jersey. It became "the second institution in the north avowedly run by the Ku Klux Klan to further its aims and principles." Alma White said that the Klan philosophy "will sweep through the intellectual student classes as through the masses of the people." At that time, the Pillar of Fire was publishing the pro-KKK monthly periodical The Good Citizen.

On May 3, 1923, around 12,000 people attended a Klan meeting in Bound Brook, New Jersey. The speakers held a meeting at the Pillar of Fire headquarters in nearby Zarephath where a crowd of angry locals surrounded the church to let them know that they were not welcome.

On May 10, 1923 the Klan assaulted a boy, accusing him of stealing $50 from his mother, Bessie Titus, in West Belmar, New Jersey.

On August 24, 1923 the Klan held a large meeting in a ten-acre field off the Freehold Turnpike in western Farmingdale, New Jersey. The Klan claimed to have drawn members from Monmouth, Middlesex and Ocean counties and inducted 1,700 members. 1,200 cars were said to have parked along roadways, in driveways, and in every available spot. Arthur Hornbui Bell opened the meeting before introducing the principal speaker, dubbed Colonel Sherman of Atlanta, Georgia. Several inductees from Keyport, New Jersey were escorted to the event by Klansmen from that borough.

In 1925 Alma White published The Ku Klux Klan In Prophecy in Zarephath at the Pillar of Fire Church printing press. She writes: "The unrepentant Hebrew is everywhere among us today as the strong ally of Roman Catholicism. ... To think of our Hebrew friends with their millions in gold and silver aiding the Pope in his aspirations for world supremacy, is almost beyond the grasp of ... The Jews in New York City openly boast that they have the money and Rome the power, and that if they decide to rule the city and state, ..."

In 1926, Arthur Hornbui Bell headed a group that converted Wall Township's Camp Evans into a Klan resort. The property was formerly known as Marconi Station. The 396-acre (1.60 km²) resort was open only to officials and members of the New Jersey Realm of the Klan.

In May of 1926, eugenicist and birth control advocate Margaret Sanger spoke to a meeting of the women's chapter of the Klan in Silver Lake, New Jersey. According to her 1938 autobiography, Sanger's speech to the group was well received, she conversed with members late into the night and was invited to speak to other similar groups.

The New Jersey Ku Klux Klan held a Fourth of July celebration from July 3–5, 1926, in Long Branch, New Jersey, that featured a "Miss 100% America" pageant.

In 1926 Alma White published Klansmen: Guardians of Liberty. She writes: "I believe in white supremacy."

In 1928 Alma White published Heroes of the Fiery Cross. She writes: "The Jews are as unrelenting now as they were two thousand years ago."

In 1940, James A. Colescott had Bell removed as head of the Klan in New Jersey. Bell was also vice president of the German American Bund. The ouster was from a joint meeting arranged by Bell between the Klan and the German American Bund at the Bund's Camp Nordlund, near Andover, New Jersey.

In 1943 Alma White of the Pillar of Fire Church reprinted her pro-Klan essays and sermons as Guardians of Liberty.

By 1944 the national organization was closed by a tax lien by the Internal Revenue Service. Local chapters closed over the following years.

People

• Arthur Hornbui Bell was the Grand Dragon.
• Alma White was a local preacher who supported the Klan in her publications and sermons.
• Alton Milford Young, a minister and Grand Kaliff.
• George W. Apgar was the King Kleagle.

Klan-friendly churches

Several New Jersey churches welcomed the Klan:

• Pillar of Fire Church in Zarephath
• Third Presbyterian Church in Elizabeth
• Grace Methodist Church in Kearny
• First Baptist Church in Bayonne
• Calvary Methodist Episcopal Church in Paterson
• Grace Methodist Episcopal Church in Newark
• Colonial United Methodist Church in Oxford

See also

• Ku Klux Klan in Inglewood, California
• Indiana Klan
• Tulsa race riot