5. KKK in Oregon

In this photograph from the early 1920s, probably taken in Portland, robed and hooded members of the Ku Klux Klan shared a stage with members of the Royal Riders of the Red Robe, a KKK auxiliary for foreign-born white Protestants. A large banner announcing “Jesus Saves” occupied a prominent position on the wall, testifying to the important role that Protestantism played in the KKK philosophy of “100 percent Americanism.” The Klan’s ideas of what it meant to be an American developed during World War I as a reaction to the perceived threat to national unity posed by the influx of non-Protestant, non-English-speaking immigrants.