Stetson Kennedy A True American Hero Passes Away

[Steely Dan]

http://www.ocala.com/article/20110827/ARTICLES/110829754/1402/NEWS

...But the greatest thing one might say about Stetson is that he had the courage to infiltrate the Ku Klux Klan at great risk to his life and health, and from within he exposed the Klan for the kind of people they were.”...

I read the book SK wrote about infiltrating the Klan and the dude had big cajones. IIRC, he was writing for a newspaper while he was a "Klan Member" and he would sit in meetings and listen to the men talk about him and what they should do to him if they ever came across him. It's a great read. I loved it.

I think you can say about Stetson Kennedy the same thing you can say about any great human. He made a positive difference. He wasn't a well known name in all of America but his work helped to expose the Klan and helped lead to a more civil society.

RIP Stetson, you're one of my heroes.

 

[youshouldveknown]

Wow, I'd really like to read that. Thank you for posting this. RIP Stetson Kennedy.

 

[LadyL]

Thanks Steely. I'd never heard of him and now I want to read the book too.

 

[shana]

Thank you so much for the thread, Steely Dan. I had not heard of this gentleman either until you alerted us to his passing.

[ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stetson_Kennedy"]Stetson Kennedy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia@@AMEPARAM@@/wiki/File:Stetson_Kennedy.jpg" class="image" title="1620"><img alt="" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Stetson_Kennedy.jpg"@@AMEPARAM@@commons/a/a4/Stetson_Kennedy.jpg[/ame]

...and an official website bearing his name and currently maintained by his grandson:

http://stetsonkennedy.com/

 

[Steely Dan]

Thank you so much for the thread, Steely Dan. I had not heard of this gentleman either until you alerted us to his passing.

Stetson Kennedy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

...and an official website bearing his name and currently maintained by his grandson:

http://stetsonkennedy.com/

Thank you so much for posting that. I never knew he worked with Zora Neale Hurston. "Their Eyes Were Watching God" is an amazing book and I recommend it highly. It's a great work of fiction.

 

[Steely Dan]

http://gawker.com/5898493/my-kasual-kountry-weekend-with-the-knights-of-the-ku-klux-klan

My Kasual Kountry Weekend With the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan
By Hamilton Nolan

...In the late 1940s, the author Stetson Kennedy went undercover in the Georgia Ku Klux Klan. It was a life-threatening activity. In a book, he included some of the Klan's suggested punishment for "rats" in their midst: "Let's take him out in the woods, fasten him to a log with a staple over his testicles, set fire to the log, give him a knife and tell him to ‘Cut or burn!'"...

Here's the link to the Jeannie Nuss article mentioned in the article above; http://cnsnews.com/news/article/ark-town-known-ties-kkk-tries-rebrand

 

[deca]

He sounds like an amazing man. Rest In Peace. I don't think I could ever be that brave.



On a lighter note...his name certainly sounds heroic..I mean, it is like a cowboy's name or something.

 

[Steely Dan]

He sounds like an amazing man. Rest In Peace. I don't think I could ever be that brave.



On a lighter note...his name certainly sounds heroic..I mean, it is like a cowboy's name or something.

It is a very cool name.