Yesterday's Print

Showing 16 posts tagged bomb

A collection of old photographs, historic newspaper clippings and assorted excerpts highlighting the parallels of past and present. Featuring weird, funny and baffling headlines, articles and advertisements! Visit www.yesterdays-print.com 

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San Francisco Chronicle, July 22, 1916

The route of the Preparedness Day parade, held in anticipation of the United States entry into WWI. A suitcase bomb, placed along the route, killed 10 and injured an additional 40 persons. The bomb was believed to be placed by two labor bosses, who were sentenced to death, later commuted to life in prison and finally pardoned, when later investigation showed much of the testimony during the trial to be falsified. 

William Bailey, WWII veteran and middle school science teacher (and head of his department), whose house, shared with his wife and 12-year-old son, was bombed with dynamite on March 16, 1952, is honored on April 1, 1952.

The bombings by white resisters were common in transitional neighborhoods where black residents were purchasing property, such as South Central LA, Inglewood, Lynwood and Compton. Even after the bomb went off, multiple residents called the police to report threatening letters and phone calls, telling them to leave (example below).

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In July, Bailey would sue the city of Los Angeles for willful neglect and failure to provide protection, believing the city had prior knowledge of the bombings.

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Some white neighborhoods would advertise their exclusivity:

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Aftermath of the bomb thrown during an anarchist meeting in Union Square, 1908.

The bomb, meant to be aimed at police, detonated early. It thrown by Selig Silverstein, a 21-year-old member of the ‘Anarchist Federation Union’, who claimed to have two children and a wife in Russia.

Questioned while waiting to enter emergency surgery, he claimed at first that he had made the bomb himself and planned to throw it in revenge for a beating received from the police a few days before, though later he claimed the order came from higher up.

A companion of Silverstein’s, Ignatz Hildebrandt, was killed almost instantaneously, with parts of his body found upwards of 50 feet away.

Silverstein himself was severely injured by the bombing, with both his eyes gouged out, his chest ripped open, his legs broken and the hand that held the bomb ripped off with the explosion. He died a month later, though his death was attributed to consumption. The only other injuries were on the part of the police, and these were slight.

Wall Street bombing, September 16, 1920

Thirty-eight people and one horse were killed, while another hundred and forty-three were injured. The bombing was believed to be the work of the Italian Galleanist anarchists, attempting to strike back for the arrests of Sacco and Venzetti, alleged Italian anarchists who had indicted for robbery and murder two days prior to the bombing, although this was never proven conclusively. Other suspects included the IWW, the Union of Russian Workers, and, more vaguely, communists in general.