William Joseph Simmons

William Joseph Simmons (May 6, 1880 – May 18, 1945) was the founder of the second Ku Klux Klan on Thanksgiving Night of 1915.Convalescing after being hit by an automobile in 1915, Simmons concerned himself with rebuilding the Klan, which he had seen depicted in the newly released film The Birth of a Nation. He obtained a copy of the Reconstruction Klan's "Prescript," and used it to write his own prospectus for a reincarnation of the organization. He delayed his plans until the media-inspired lynching of Leo Frank, the accused murderer of Mary Phagan. This incident became a flash point for anti-Semitic feeling in Georgia. Frank was taken from prison and hanged by a mob who lynched him on August 16, 1915. The lynch mob called themselves the Knights of Mary Phagan, and on October 16, 1915 they climbed Stone Mountain and burned a giant cross that was visible throughout the city. The imagery of the burning cross, which had not existed in the original Klan, had been introduced via The Birth of a Nation. The film, in turn, had obtained the image from the works of Thomas Dixon, Jr. He had taken his inspiration from Scottish clans, who had burned crosses as a method of signalling from one hilltop to the next. The image also occurs in Lady of the Lake by Walter Scott.

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Joseph_Simmons#Ku_Klux_Klan