Originally published in The Homesteader (Deschutes County Historical Society newsletter) on May 2017 If you have attended a History Pub at McMenamins Old St. Francis School in Bend, you may have seen an illustration of an audience of white-clad KKK members seated in front of a Catholic priest. You may have surmised that the incident happened elsewhere. After all, history books tell us the Klan was a racist movement in the southern part of the United States – far away from Bend, Oregon. The event actually took place in Bend, almost 100 years ago, when Father Luke Sheehan stepped onto the … Continue reading Father Luke, The KKK, and the doctrine of Americanism in Bend