Ku Klux Klan

GETTYSBURG, Pa. - The local chapter of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan will hold a rally at a national park for the second time in four months. The organization applied for and received a special-use permit to conduct the three-hour afternoon protest Sept. 2 at Gettysburg National Military Park, according to park spokeswoman Katie Lawhon. According to a statement from the park, staff will work to ensure that park resources and visitors are not adversely affected by the rally or any counterdemonstrations, which may be scheduled with additional permits.

The World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan has received permission to rally at Antietam National Battlefield in June, park superintendent John Howard said Tuesday. Read the full story in Wednesday's Herald-Mail newspapers.

About 30 members of the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups rallied Saturday at Antietam National Battlefield, the first time a group has been given permission to demonstrate at the site of the bloodiest day of the Civil War. At the same time in Keedysville, a group known as "Love, Not Hate," which includes citizens, churches and civic organizations, hosted a celebration of diversity at Taylor Park. See Sunday's Herald-Mail for the full stories.

HAGERSTOWN A member of a local Ku Klux Klan chapter probably wrote an anti-black hate letter to a Hagerstown organization in January, the chapter leader said Wednesday. Gordon Young, the imperial wizard of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, said Wednesday he's "70 percent sure" a chapter member sent a hate letter to the Martin Luther King Community Center in Hagerstown. Brothers United Who Dare to Care, a black community group, has its office at the center. The end of the letter says, "KKK will again cleanse this town of its filth.

gregs@herald-mail.com On the heels of a Ku Klux Klan march two weeks ago in Sharpsburg that drew as many police as bystanders, Klan members are planning more local activity, the leader of an interstate Klan organization based in Sharpsburg said Thursday. Klan members today will drop off literature and applications to join the Klan in Sharpsburg, said Gordan Young, imperial wizard of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Young said he has been discussing with other groups plans to hold another rally in Maryland before the end of the year, either in Allegany County or in Washington County.

andrews@herald-mail.com SHARPSBURG - When the Ku Klux Klan marches and rallies in Sharpsburg on Aug. 28, a nearby church hopes to hold a separate community event. The Rev. Malcolm Stranathan of Salem United Methodist Church in Keedysville said the event - away from the rally - wouldn't be a counterprotest, but a declaration that the community doesn't share the Klan's views. "It is just to lift up the solidarity of the community," he said. A meeting to plan the community event will be held at the church Wednesday at 7 p.m. The greater South Mountain community and all Washington County houses of worship are invited, Stranathan said.

People and organizations interested in participating, donating or helping at events planned to counter the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan's rally planned for June 10 still can sign up. Civic and volunteer organizations and churches also are welcome to set up informational booths at Taylor Park in Keedysville, where the afternoon's activities are taking place, said the Rev. Malcolm Stranathan. All the activities are free, he said. For more information, send e-mail to United Methodist Church of Keedysville at celebrate@salemcommunity.

julieg@herald-mail.com SHARPSBURG -A fence and police will be the barriers used to prevent any potential riots from occurring at an Aug. 28 rally the Ku Klux Klan is planning at a town park, Sharpsburg Town Attorney Charles Wagaman said at Monday night's mayor and Town Council meeting. Gordon Young, imperial wizard for the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, asked Wagaman about parking and barrier issues at Monday's meeting because he said he was unable to reach Wagaman twice by phone.

FREDERICK, Md. - By introducing legislation to target hate groups, Del. Sue Hecht said she wants to dispel the perception that Western Maryland is a hotbed for the Ku Klux Klan. cont. from front page Hecht, D-Frederick/Washington, said Monday she will file a bill to make it a crime to wear a mask or hood during a public demonstration. "Let's unmask the Ku Klux Klan and bigotry. If hate groups want protection under our laws of freedom, let us be free to see their faces.

tarar@herald-mail.com HAGERSTOWN - Hagerstown resident AnnaMarie McDonagh was visiting relatives on Oak Hill Avenue on Easter Sunday when a rolled-up flier arrived on the front porch around dinnertime. McDonagh said she and her family were "alarmed" over its contents: A group calling itself the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, with headquarters in Sharpsburg, was looking for members. "To me, that is an invasion of privacy," McDonagh said Monday. "For it to be handed out in a family-oriented neighborhood is alarming to me. " McDonagh, who has worked as a trauma technician at Washington County Hospital, said seeing the flier was more startling than anything she has seen on the job. "With being trained and being around alarming things, this would bother me the most because it teaches hate," she said.

HARPERS FERRY, W.VA. - A planned rally Saturday in Harpers Ferry by the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan will be countered by an event sponsored by another organization whose members believe it is time to "stand up and say something" about hate and violence spreading across the country. A group of local churches has been working to launch the creation of the Love Your Neighbor Coalition and the group will sponsor an event at Bolivar Park along Washington Street from 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday, the same time the KKK will be holding a rally in Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.

So now, following on the heels of its Antietam and Gettysburg Battlefield tour, the Ku Klux Klan is sallying forth to Harpers Ferry National Historical Park later this month for its next rally - if a dozen people or so a rally make. It's more like a rallette, I would think. In a way, I suppose it makes sense, as you can argue that Harpers Ferry is "the place it all began," so the Klan showing up on John Brown's doorstep is just as natural as the Beatles returning to Liverpool or Michael Moore returning to the breakfast bar at Stuckey's.

HARPERS FERRY, W.Va. - The World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan has received a permit to stage a rally in Harpers Ferry National Historical Park on Saturday, Oct. 14, a park official and a KKK spokesman said Wednesday. The topic of the rally will be "Black Crimes in White America," and among the issues that are expected to be discussed was the recent celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Niagara Movement in the park, said Gordon Young, a Washington County resident and imperial wizard of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.

GETTYSBURG, Pa. - The local chapter of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan will hold a rally at a national park for the second time in four months. The organization applied for and received a special-use permit to conduct the three-hour afternoon protest Sept. 2 at Gettysburg National Military Park, according to park spokeswoman Katie Lawhon. According to a statement from the park, staff will work to ensure that park resources and visitors are not adversely affected by the rally or any counterdemonstrations, which may be scheduled with additional permits.

KEEDYSVILLE For the Rev. Malcolm Stranathan of Salem United Methodist Church in Keedysville, hearing that the Ku Klux Klan planned another rally in the Sharpsburg area was a case of deja vu all over again. When the Klan planned a parade in Sharpsburg two years ago, Stranathan and other citizens planned their own "peace and unity" events in the area, hoping to draw attention away from the Klan. In the end, few showed up for the Klan's activities. But those first events in response to the Klan gave birth to a new organization - "Love, Not Hate" - which mobilized citizens, churches and civic organizations to plan a daylong celebration of diversity Saturday at Keedysville's Taylor Park.

There are those who tend to look at modern-day Ku Klux Klan members as the equivalent of rebellious teens who have their bodies pierced in a bid to outrage their parents and/or call attention to themselves. Others see Klan members as people on the margins of society, drawn to the group because of a need to belong or to find someone to blame for their own lack of success. Which is it? Without talking to members, it's difficult to say. It is an activity we would recommend as part of the anti-Klan activities planned for June 10, when World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan plan to rally at Antietam National Battlefield.

People and organizations interested in participating, donating or helping at events planned to counter the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan's rally planned for June 10 still can sign up. Civic and volunteer organizations and churches also are welcome to set up informational booths at Taylor Park in Keedysville, where the afternoon's activities are taking place, said the Rev. Malcolm Stranathan. All the activities are free, he said. For more information, send e-mail to United Methodist Church of Keedysville at celebrate@salemcommunity.

John Howard, superintendent of Antietam National Battlefield, probably felt that he had little choice but to allow the Ku Klux Klan to soil what many consider to be sacred ground. But he's too sharp a guy not to understand and at some level appreciate the myriad of ironies. In granting the Klan's request for a rally at Antietam, Howard did the right thing, and not just because the Constitution says he had little choice. Free speech is a federal foundation so nowhere can this be more undeniable than on federal property.

"I am always so sad when I hear about all these young people losing their ever-promising lives to car accidents. I wish the law would change the legal age to drive to 18. I did not let my two daughters drive alone until they were in 12th grade and graduating at that time. When they got their learner's permit, I explained to them both that driving is a privilege, not just because you turn 16. I then told them they had to drive only with myself or their father in the car with them and there would be no other friends allowed in the car. I also told them if their grades were bad they would not get to drive at all. So I think I was very strict but I also have two daughters now ages 26 and 22 who have perfect driving records.

Despite a scheduled rally of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, events at Antietam National Battlefield will go on as planned, the park superintendent said Wednesday. People participating in a five-kilometer run the same day as a Klan rally set for June 10 from 2 to 5 p.m. likely will not even know the rally is going, John Howard said. "Odds are they will not even know setup's happening from the other end of the park," Howard said. The race is in the morning, Howard said, and according to a permit signed by Gordon Young, the commander of the World Knights, setup for the rally can begin at 11:30 a.m. The U.S. Constitution is cited as the authority allowing the Klan to use the park.