El Pasoan and bestselling author, Ron Stallworth, joins hosts Stephanie Valle and Lisa Elliott to discuss his biography that spawned the award winning film "BlacKkKlansman."
"Ron Stallworth is a law enforcement veteran and the first Black detective in the Colorado Springs Police Department. He has worked undercover narcotics, vice, criminal intelligence, and organized crime beats in four states. His #1 New York Times bestselling book, Black Klansman: A Memoir, is the basis for the major motion picture BlacKkKlansman, written and directed by Spike Lee and starring John David Washington and Adam Driver. The film received six nominations at the 91st Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Supporting Actor, and won the award for Best Adapted Screenplay. The film also earned four nominations at the 76th Golden Globe Awards, including Best Motion Picture – Drama.
In 1978, Ron worked undercover and infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan chapter in Colorado Springs. By recruiting his partner Chuck to play the “white” Ron Stallworth in person, while speaking as himself to Klan members over the phone, Ron helped sabotage cross burnings, expose white supremacists in the military, and combat domestic terrorism. Even more incredibly, Ron also befriended (and fooled) Grand Wizard David Duke. Later on, Ron led an undercover investigation into the anti-Klan protesters of the Progressive Labor Party.
Raised in El Paso, Texas, Ron received his B.A. in Criminal Justice Administration from Columbia College in 2007. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 1998 Outstanding National Leadership Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Gang Crime Research Center. His media appearances include interviews with MSNBC, CNN, NPR, BBC, Vice magazine, Daily Mail, and more. In addition to Black Klansman, Ron is also the author of Bringing the Noise: Gangster-Reality Rap and the Dynamics of Black Social Revolution and Gangsta Code: The Sociological Implications of Gangster Rap Music and Hip Hop Culture." - Macmillan Speakers
Black Klansman
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The Gangs of Zion
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Alone in the World Looking
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Elroy Bode Fund - El Paso Community Foundation
“I walk. I smile. I am rewarded,” El Paso author and teacher Elroy Bode wrote in his book In A Special Light.
Now eligible Austin High School students pursuing degrees in the English arts can be rewarded with a scholarship from the Elroy Bode Fund.
The fund was created by Ron and Patsy Stallworth, who studied English with Elroy Bode at Austin High School, where he taught English and creative writing for 30 years — and had a profound impact on his students.
After Ron retired from police work, he turned to Bode to edit his 2014 book, Black Klansman, which was turned into Spike Lee’s powerful, Academy Award-winning box office hit film. Macmillan’s 2018 reissue of the book became a New York Times best-seller. Ron’s 2024 book Gangs of Zion examines the correlation between gangs and rap music.
The Stallworths are giving back with the Elroy Bode Fund, which will provide financial assistance to eligible Austin High School students who plan to pursue college degrees in English arts fields, such as creative writing, journalism, communication and English.
In addition to his long teaching career, Elroy Bode, who died in 2017 at the age of 86, wrote 10 books from 1973 to 2014, including Alone in the World Looking, To Be Alive, This Favored Place, and El Paso Days. El Paso figured prominently into many of his works. He was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters in 1966, received two Southwest Book Awards from the Border Regional Library Association and was named the El Paso Independent School District’s teacher of the year for the 1977-78 school year.
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