Still, lynching Jews, a new Klan with the support of a President (probably a Republican, wasn't he) and playing baseball only a decade later.
I don't know if you're being facetious here, SJackson, but about the only President with whom you might say the Klan was popular was the one in office in 1915, Democrat Woodrow Wilson, who was born and raised in Georgia. During Wilson's term, there was a screening of the newly released silent film Birth of a Nation - which featured the Klan in a positive light - at the White House.
The Republican president in office in 1926 at the time of the baseball game mentioned in this thread was Calvin Coolidge, who was most definitely not an anti-Semite nor racist, nor a KKK supporter. (You might want to read the biography "Coolidge," by Amity Shlaes, released last year.)
As far as "lynchings" of Jews are concerned, the only one known in American history was Leo Frank in 1915.
Please see my post # 9.
Yes. The new incarnation of the KKK was birthed by the Mary Phagan League/Knights of Mary Phagan. Mary was the girl Leo Frank was accused of murdering. They were a small group, in the dozens, but when they adapted the KKK moniker and added blacks to their hate list along with Jews and Catholics, their membership expanded. Wilson was President through their genesis and early growth. Though the Klan probably reached their peak in the 20s, their were birthed and growing rapidly throughout the Wilson years. His reaction, give them a boost.
This game isn't as strange as it seems today. The Klan of the 1920's was not a back-alley organization but a very mainstream one. Even President Warren G. Harding was initiated into it in the White House.
There are three distinct periods in KKK history. The original KKK (the one during Reconstruction) was not anti-Semitic or anti-Catholic (it had Catholic and Jewish members, such as Dr. Simon Baruch, Jefferson Davis' personal physician) and did not burn crosses. It served as a kind of "underground government" during Reconstruction and was used to counteract the Republican "carpetbag" governments. Its targets were Blacks, Republicans, and US soldiers(!!!!!).
The second Klan is the one founded by Col. Simmons in Georgia and which reached its peak in the Twenties. It was a mainstream organization whose target was primarily Catholics. It also supported such traditionally progressive positions as prohibition and women's suffrage. Ironically, Thomas Dixon (author of the books that became the inspiration for Birth of a Nation), though he hated Blacks, had no use whatsoever for this revived Klan. The reason? Because they were anti-Catholic and anti-Jewish! (Dixon was neither.)
The Third Klan began to evolve during the Thirties but came into its own in the post-WWII civil rights era (this is the Klan most people think of and incorrectly retroject into the previous two eras). It is primarily anti-Semitic, though of course strongly anti-Black as well.
Hope this clears some stuff up. My ancestors, as pro-Union "scalawags," sort of learned all this stuff firsthand.