ABSTRACT
The Ku Klux Klan that surfaced all over the United States in the early 1920s enjoyed a phenomenal degree of mainstream popularity. Central to the hooded organization's ascendancy, and playing a number of vital roles in its spectacular success, was its abundant print culture. The KKK endeavored to construct itself as a positive force in American national life and skillfully utilized print media to this end. Their vivid propaganda creations aimed in equal measure at smearing the Catholic Church and exalting its Protestant counterpart were designed to cause widespread moral outrage at the corrupting advances of "foreign doctrines". The most immediately striking function of Klan print was its propagandistic power. Pro-Klan writers, print editors, and pamphleteers primarily concerned themselves with constructing a positive public identity for the secret order: a heroic and reassuring image defined in binary opposition to their simultaneous constructions of a monstrous national enemy.
