Atlanta, GA, Aug. 14—Colonel W.J. Simmons, Imperial Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, has issued the following statement in reply to the published statement of Bruce Craven of North Carolina that he had withdrawn from the organization and, as Grand Dragon of that state, had disbanded the Klan in North Carolina:
“Bruce Craven is not an officer of the Ku Klux Klan and never has been. He has no official connection with the organization whatever. He seems to have a peculiar sense of humor, for he has just as much authority to declare the Ku Klux Klan of North Carolina disbanded as I have to declare the Knights of Columbus in America disbanded. When the Ku Klux Klan held its annual konklave in Atlanta last May several members of the Klan, with Bruce Craven, came to me and asked that when I came to make the appointment of a Grand Dragon for that state, that I give serious consideration to Mr. Craven for the place. I thanked the gentlemen and told them that when I took up that phase of the work Mr. Craven would be given the consideration. Within a few days after he returned to North Carolina, Mr. Craven began bombarding me with letters and telegrams in several of which he emphatically demanded that he be appointed at once to the office of Grand Dragon. This attitude within itself disqualified him to a certain extent for the appointment, as offices in this organization are not distributed with references to political pull, but entirely upon worthiness and fitness to hold the position under consideration. Further, it was not possible for me at that time to make the appointment of Grand Dragon in any State, no, no grand dragon for any state having been appointed even to this time because the details of his duties have not yet been mapped out. Mr. Craven fully understood this situation and in the face of that he sent me a communication in which he threatened to take the section which he subsequently took unless his appointment was made at once. When Mr. Craven received no reply to this communication, he violated his oath as a member of the organization and assumed authority which he did not have and which he never has had, by declaring that he was the supreme head of the organization in North Carolina, and as such (line obscured) Craven is merely a disgruntled office seeker who did not get what he wanted as soon as he wanted it and adopted his own peculiar method of “getting even” with the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and its chief officer,” said W.J. Simmons, Imperial Wizard, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.
From the front page of The Dunn Dispatch, Tuesday, August 16, 1921
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