![]() Those who know him offer more complex motives. His outreach to racists is motivated by simple curiosity, he says. Lounging comfortably in his overstuffed easy chair, he chortles. Given the history of lynchings and other horrific acts of violence associated with the Klan, there are some common assumptions one could make about Davis: that he's nuts. To win over racism goes well beyond the scope of any book. But to win over a racist is one thing, Davis has learned. These he likes to display as totems of victory. Eleven of them gave Davis their robes and other Klan paraphernalia. Davis is not a polished writer but his 304-page book succeeds in recounting an unlikely story: How a black man a diplomat's son, armed only with a handshake won some unlikely friends.ĭavis has helped persuade at least a dozen hard-core racists to quit the Klan. The publisher, New Horizon Press, favors populist genres like true crime, self-help and first-person success fables. So he wrote one: "Klan-Destine Relationships: A Black Man's Odyssey in the Ku Klux Klan." It sketches the history of the KKK, the history of Daryl Davis, and the collision of the two. Over time, he found himself with enough material for a book. Many snapshots of robed figures hang in his living room, next to pictures featuring Davis crushing the hand of some celebrity. But what I learned was that while you are actively learning about somebody else, you are passively teaching them about yourself." In between gigs, he arranged meetings with white separatists and supremacists. "My goal was not to convert anybody at all," Davis says, "because if they want to be in the Klan that's their business. To shake their hands and ask hard questions. Davis has made it his business to meet people who hate him. ![]() Music is his primary mission in life.īut for nearly as long, he's pursued a second mission, intertwined with the first. For 18 years, pounding a piano has been Davis's vocation. Well enough, in fact, to earn Davis slots with two Grammy-winning bands. It seems impossible that those huge jackhammer fingers could glide with such precision over the ivories, but they do. There's no bell on the door of Daryl Davis's modest Silver Spring home the ring would just get lost too often among the notes from the electric grand piano by the front window. It is, in a strange way, a small piece of himself. The black man's hand folds around the half-dollar-size piece of bronze, wedging it deeply behind thick knuckles. He demands that Davis give him the medallion. He, Chester Doles, a white supremacist, will never pose with a black man. He derides the men in the pictures as mere white separatists and worthless Klansmen. Davis also displays a medallion stamped into it are the words "KKK Member in good standing."ĭoles goes ballistic. There's Imperial Wizard Roger Kelly, Grand Giant Tony LaRicci, Grand Giant Bob White. ![]() Davis retrieves them from the car, spreads them out. Doles, breaking free of the handshake, calls for the photos. In a letter requesting this interview, Davis claimed to have pictures of his meetings with other ranking Klansmen. But the pale, tattooed hand is going nowhere, not while entangled in the huge, calm fingers of the darker hand. The black man gets a good grip and holds on while he answers, telling Doles about the other Klansmen he's met. Whether out of courtesy or plain habit, Doles takes it. ![]() Soon Chester Doles is storming around, loudly demanding to know just what the hell business a black man has with the Ku Klux Klan. The black man offers his hand and his name: "I'm Daryl Davis." The Knighthawk's hand is swallowed up in the massive grip. Inferring a truce, the Klansman cocks his knife and hangs it at the ready from a belt loop. The black man slides off the hood, meets the Klansman halfway, palms open and visible, eyes locked. He's sporting a T-shirt that says "It's a white thing, you wouldn't understand." He flicks open a large knife and carefully approaches the Lincoln. He's a Knighthawk the bodyguard for the regional KKK leader. The door swings wide and a beefy guy lurches out. The black man gives them a friendly wave. However, the large dude perched on the hood is clearly non-Anglo-Saxon. Grand Klaliff Chester Doles of the Invisible Empire, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, and his retinue were supposed to be meeting some guy in a Town Car. Seven unsmiling faces peer at the man on the car. Two cars pull slowly into the lot after circling the perimeter. He studies each car that turns into the plaza not exactly sure what to look for, but certain of one thing: When the Klansmen arrive, they won't be amused. He's waiting for the Ku Klux Klan to show up. On a scorching summer day in Elkton, Md., in the middle of a half-empty shopping center parking lot, a man sits on the hood of his Lincoln Town Car, mopping his brow and consulting his wristwatch. James Fallows Fired After Stormy Tenure At U.S. ![]()
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