El Paso, TX (KFOX14\/CBS4) \u2014 The Ku Klux Klan\u2019s presence in El Paso in the early 1920s came amid a push to reshape the city\u2019s image as it grew into a regional business hub, according to local history enthusiast Caleb Lara. <\/p>\n
ARC El Paso spoke to him at Tom Lea Park, and he went into detail about the brief but significant history of the Ku Klux Klan in El Paso. All of Lara’s findings were indeed consistent with this full report published by the El Paso County Historical Society.<\/p>\n
The KKK started in El Paso in 1921, Lara said, placing it in the broader context of the city\u2019s development after El Paso \u201creally broke off in 1881 when the railroad started here.\u201d In the years that followed, Lara said, there was \u201ca real big effort to try to get rid of the wild, wild west,\u201d including efforts to eliminate gambling and prostitution.<\/p>\n
Lara described El Paso during Prohibition as especially unruly, saying that in the Roaring Twenties \u201cEl Paso was off the hook,\u201d with \u201call kinds of bootlegging going high.\u201d Lara said there were buildings near the center of town where people could drive into a garage, load up on alcohol and drive out without being seen.<\/p>\n
Against that backdrop, Lara said the KKK movement that arrived in El Paso in the 1920s was different from the original Klan that began in the 1800s. Lara described it as \u201ca much more well-funded movement,\u201d a \u201crevival of the original,\u201d that became \u201cmore of a political, well-organized, multimillion dollar movement.\u201d<\/p>\n
KKK era reshaped El Paso, leaving Confederate school names that still remain today<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
In El Paso, Lara said, the KKK\u2019s effort \u201cwas actually not so much about blacks,\u201d but \u201cactually about anti-Catholic.\u201d Lara also emphasized the Klan\u2019s local influence was brief: \u201cThis only happened for one year.\u201d<\/p>\n
By 1923, Lara said, Richard Dudley \u2014 who had been reelected in Austin for Congress \u2014 gave up his seat to return to El Paso and run for mayor. Dudley ran in an anti-KKK party and \u201cwon by a landslide,\u201d Lara said.<\/p>\n
Lara said the era also left a lasting mark on local institutions, including school names. \u201cA lot of the schools they renamed are still kept that name,\u201d Lara said, adding that schools were renamed for \u201cConfederate patriarchs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bowie High School, Austin High School, and Crockett Elementary School are among the schools renamed during the KKK era of El Paso that still go by those names today.<\/p>\n
I asked Lara why it is important to discuss the KKK during Black History Month. He said it is a conversation that should extend beyond the Klan to \u201cany other aspect of history,\u201d arguing that understanding the past can help people recognize patterns that can repeat. \u201cThe archetype of the situation and in that historical context is undoubtedly going to repeat itself,\u201d Lara said. \u201cAnd our job is to pick up on it.\u201d<\/p>\n
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