The Not-So-Invisible Empire. Hulton Archive/Getty Images A Klan initiation ceremony, circa 1925. No, not that movement. The one from the 1920s, with the sheets and the flaming crosses and the ludicrous name meant to evoke a heroic past. The Invisible Empire of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, they called it. And for a few years it burned across the nation, a fearsome thing to behold. In “One Hundred Percent American,” Thomas R. Tyler and Clarke kept the costumes and crosses and secret signs that Simmons loved. Klan leaders used that stunning success to insinuate the Invisible Empire into public life. Then everything came apart. Ku Klux Klan Audio — History.com. Ku Klux Klan Video — History.com. Welcome to the Ku Klux Klan: Knights Party. The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow . Jim Crow Stories . Plessy v. Ferguson.