Weird Little Guys

Decades before he sculpted a Confederate general out of old bathtubs, Jack Kershaw briefly represented his most famous client - Martin Luther King Jr's assassin, James Earl Ray. The relationship soured after Ray discovered his lawyer had pocketed a payment from Playboy magazine.

Sources:

James McKinley, "Playboy Interview: James Earl Ray," Playboy Magazine, September 1977

https://www.nytimes.com/1977/08/09/archives/polygraph-indicates-ray-lied.html
https://www.nytimes.com/1977/10/25/archives/james-earl-ray-wants-mark-lane-to-replace-his-tenth-lawyer.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/28/sports/the-barkley-marathons-few-know-how-to-enter-fewer-finish.html
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Molly interviews Michael Edison Hayden about his new book, Strange People on the Hill: How Extremism Tore Apart a Small Town. The book is an intimate portrait of what happened in Berkeley Springs, West Virginia after a white nationalist group moved into the castle on the hill.
Preorder the book now or buy it anywhere books are sold when it comes out on April 7, 2026
https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/michael-edison-hayden/strange-people-on-the-hill/9781645030607/
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Jack Kershaw created his most famous piece of art in his 80s. His lifelong passion for the arts had to take a backseat when he shifted his focus to becoming a professional racist during the fight against integration. He was doing it for his confederate ancestors, he would often say. But he was never very specific about who exactly his ancestors were...

The It Could Happen Here episode mentioned, originally aired 2/22/2024 -
https://open.spotify.com/episode/1ZQAqsxImsNGQUTzHGKhNp

Sources:

https://thesewaneepurple.org/2021/03/23/polk-sculpture-donated-by-white-supremacist-jack-kershaw/
https://thesewaneepurple.org/2021/03/22/polk-sculpture-removed-by-student-taken-to-archives/
https://meridiana.sewanee.edu/2022/04/30/a-year-later-a-letter-of-explanation/
https://www.moca.org/collection/work/unmanned-drone
https://religiondispatches.org/2025/10/28/swords-plowshares
https://www.sipcville.com/
https://www.vpm.org/news/2026-03-23/swords-into-plowshares-cville-jefferson-school-designs-hood-push-mass
https://www.vpm.org/news/2024-05-23/swords-into-plowshares-robert-e-lee-statue-charlottesville-centennial
https://www.npr.org/2021/02/23/970610428/nearly-100-confederate-monuments-removed-in-2020-report-says-more-than-700-remai
https://segregationinamerica.eji.org/report/confederate-icongraphy.html
https://wpln.org/post/even-as-statue-forrest-still-draws-fire/
https://www.upi.com/Archives/1982/03/30/Ray-says-lawyer-hid-Playboy-fee/1722386312400/

The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, August 2017
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvCjM1lPwg4
Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, October 2017
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5b_-TZwQ0I
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Before we leave the novels of William Luther Pierce behind us, let's take a quick look at the real Earl Turner. The protagonist of The Turner Diaries was, like all of Pierce's characters, named after a real guy he knew.
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At the end of this exploration of nazi serial killer Joseph Paul Franklin and the novel loosely based on his crimes, the question remains: did any of his friends in the white power movement know what he was going to do before he did it? What clues does the novel hold?

Sources:
Pierce, Kelvin. Sins of My Father, Growing Up with America's Most Dangerous White Supremacist. Independently Published, 2020

Griffin, R. S. (2001). The Fame of a Dead Man’s Deeds. 1st Books Library.

Mel Ayton, Dark Soul of the South: The Life and Crimes of Racist Killer Joseph Paul Franklin, Potomac Press, Inc., 2011

Sunshine, Spencer (2024). Neo-Nazi Terrorism and Countercultural Fascism: The Origins and Afterlife of James Mason’s Siege (1st ed.). New York, NY: Routledge

Bill Simmons, "Defendants All Acquitted In Sedition Trial," AP News, April 8, 1988

https://www.kcur.org/news/2024-04-12/overland-park-antisemitic-murders-jewish-community-center-shooting-survivors
https://www.sacbee.com/news/nation-world/article2595772.html
http://www.kansas.com/2014/04/15/3406670/records-suggest-federal-authorities.html
https://momentsthatsurvive.org/tribute/pierce-hastings/
https://www.wunc.org/2014-04-15/an-idiot-with-a-gun-leaves-families-in-kansas-reeling
https://www.kmbc.com/article/shooting-victim-remembered-for-upbeat-attitude-work-with-kids/3681879
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