MOVE Bombing By Philadelphia Police A Forgotten Blip In History

On May 13, 1985, Philadelphia police had a long-standing dispute with the African-American liberation group known as MOVE. MOVE was located in a residential housing block in the Cobbs Creek neighborhood of Philadelphia. On this day simmering tensions between the police and the group literally exploded when during a stand off the police dropped C4 explosives on the house occupied by MOVE, the explosions started a fire that the city allowed to burn. In the blast and resulting fire 61 homes were destroyed, 250 people were left homeless and 11 people were killed, 5 of them children.

Animosity between MOVE and their neighbors, the city, and especially the police had been long-standing and previously led to a standoff in 1978 where one police officer was killed. 

MOVE was created in 1972 by Vincent Leaphart, who changed his name to John Africa. He formed a quasi-religious group based on the idea all living things “MOVE” or they are dead. The tenants of the group were a mixture of the Black liberation ideology of the Black Panthers and Primitive Ecology/ Animal Welfare. In general, John Africa’s teachings were against modern technology and the police and authoritarian state. 

Donald Glassy a social worker from the University of Pennsylvania helped John Africa, who was functionally illiterate, write out the group's guidelines and manifesto and allowed the group to create a commune living arrangement in the Powelton Villiage neighborhood. In these early years, MOVE grew modestly but was very active in protesting circuses, zoos, and animal testing labs as well as the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant and police brutality. However, they were also gaining a lot of very negative attention from their neighbors. The group often broadcast their beliefs through loudspeakers to everyone and had a habit of “Natural Living” so they didn’t always meet the city’s or their neighbor's standards of hygiene or waste removal.

By 1977 the city had enough of the complaints and ordered the group to leave the Powelton Village townhouse. For nearly a year police and social workers, as well as fire and sanitation attempted to get the group to leave. Finally, on August 8, 1978, this all came to a head and the police entered the building, reportedly meeting and exchanging gunfire with members of MOVE. During this first siege, Philadelphia Stakeout Officer James Ramp was shot and killed. Nine members of MOVE were arrested and sentenced to 100 years in prison each. Subsequent investigation of the shootout indicates that friendly fire from other officers actually killed Ramp, mostly because mo functioning firearms were taken from the MOVE members. Three of these members died in prison and six others were eventually paroled between 2018 and 2020.

This siege set up the ongoing conflict between MOVE and the Philadelphia police. In 1981 the group moved into their new communal home at 6221 Osage Avenue in the Cobbs Creek neighborhood; it wasn’t very long before their neighbors once again began complaining of the noise from the group and their loudspeaker broadcasts. Also the sanitation concerns once again became an issue. Starting in 1983 complaints from neighbors began rolling in among them; MOVE members reportedly removed the flea collars off of their neighbors’ pets, collected and fed wild animals, built pigeon coops, and left their refuse outside in their yard. Most distressing to Osage Avenue residents was that the MOVE children appeared to be malnourished and rummaged through their trash looking for food. Summons were issued to MOVE members in the hopes they would change or mitigate their behavior. MOVE did not change its behavior, they intensified it, basically trying to take the middle-class neighborhood as a political hostage. Newly elected mayor Wilson Goode was elected on his strength with middle-class voters so the group might have had the right idea. What MOVE got critically wrong was thinking that Goode could release the MOVE 9 unilaterally. Goode for his part initially decided to take a non-confrontational stance with the group and just had city offices ignore them. His hope seemed to be that the group would tire of no utilities and leave, this of course was basically what the group believed in.

By the spring of 1985, the situation had become politically volatile for Goode. Residents of Cobbs Creek were demanding action. He asked for the police to come up with a plan of action to evict the group. One proposed idea was to secure the children and have the family court remove them. Goode also wondered if it were possible for 24 watches and when any member left have them arrested. At this time MOVE was bringing in railroad ties and steel plates and fortifying the townhouse and the neighbors were not helping matters by arming themselves.

On the morning of May 13, 500 police moved into the neighborhood to evacuate other residents in homes close by and to serve warrants on MOVE members. Police Commissioner Gregore J. Sambor took to his own bullhorn and stated, “Attention MOVE: This is America. You have to abide by the laws of the United States." 

MOVE members were given 15 minutes to come out. When they did not respond, the police decided to forcibly remove the people who remained in the house by firing tear gas into the house, MOVE members returned fire at the police. A 90-minute gunfight then occurred, with police firing 10,000 rounds of ammunition. When this did not get them out Commissioner Sambor ordered the dropping of a bomb on a building, where seven adults and six children remained inside. When the bomb hit it did not completely penetrate the building but it did set fire to the gas tank of a generator which then spread over the roof and interacted with the fumes of the tear gas and the entire building caught on fire. Goode had previously okayed the use of the explosive because at this point he was on the record saying they would arrest the MOVE members by any means necessary. Sambor stated he had the fire department stay back for fear the MOVE members would shoot them, but witness statements say police also fired on the people trying to escape the fire.

Goode and Sambor allowed the fire to burn for an hour before they had the firemen begin to do anything and turned their hoses on, three hours later many of the homes in the row housing were on fire and it was at this point firefighters took an active effort to stop the fire, it was another two hours before they gained control.

In the end, 61 homes were destroyed and another 110 damaged, 250 people were homeless and 11 MOVE members dead

Shockingly this wasn’t the end of Goode’s career as mayor three years later he was resoundingly reelected. In fact, support for the action came from every level of government and other cities immediately. Even the newspapers were not overly critical of the action. Even Roy Innes chairman of the Congress of Racial Equality stated he felt the city took appropriate action and that Goode showed incredible leadership. Prior to the bombing Goode and Sambor had done a very good propaganda job of painting the members of MOVE as the aggressors in the city and had declared MOVE a terrorist organization. Also, many people in Philadelphia remembered the 1978 incident and were on the side of law enforcement. In short order, the city moved on, and people actually seemed to forget.

On the 30th anniversary of the bombing National Public Radio and the Philadelphia Inquirer found that many young Philadelphians were completely unaware of the bombing and even though there was a  special commission ordered by Goode and two grand juries no one for the city ever faced any consequences for the bombing, loss of life or property. In 1996 Romona Africa was awarded $1.5 million as the lone survivor in a civil suit. A second civil suit awarded $12.3 million to those made homeless in 2005. While the catastrophe at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas is a touch point in time for many people the MOVE bombing is almost completely lost in the sands of time.

Sources:

https://commons.lib.jmu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1054&context=jmurj

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/10/move-1985-bombing-reconciliation-philadelphia

https://www.inquirer.com/move-bombing/

 

White Mob Lynches Black Man For Asking For A Glass Of Water

On May 11, 1963, In LaBelle, Florida Henry Patterson, a negro working on a road construction crew, was thirsty and saw a home very near where the work was being done. Patterson thought he might inquire as to getting some water, it turned out to be a tragic decision. When Patterson approached the home of Hattie Crawford, a White woman who ran outside and began screaming. Now afraid for his life Patterson went on the run. 

Newspaper reports from the time state that Patterson was arrested by the LaBelle Town Marshall who took him to the LaBelle courthouse where he met a mob of at least 200 Whites. The Marshall was intimidated and turned Patterson over to the mob. They then paraded him through the small town of LaBelle on the sideboard of a car, stopping at a county commissioner’s home where they shot him several times. After loading his body into the car and continuing their morbid parade while onlookers cheered and some grabbed the body and mutilated it for souvenirs. The mob then hung Patterson’s body from a tree on the lawn of the courthouse in LaBelle.

Seeing the violence many of the local Blacks ran from the town and local area out of fear of what was coming next, racial massacres were common in the deep south at this time. Also, most of the Blacks in or near LaBelle were part of the road construction and lived in camps, one of these camps was set afire by Whites the night after the lynching. A coroner’s inquest, ordered by Judge Wesley Richards with the support of several locals was held the next day, over 100 subpoenas went out to people who witnessed the lynching or might have been involved. During the inquest, Crawford stated she became scared when Patterson entered her kitchen however other witnesses called and said she told them Patterson was never in the house and she ran when she saw him on her porch. 

Because the state was experiencing a land boom and rising economy the Florida Chamber of Commerce proactively initiated a call to the Governor’s office directly requesting him to send national guard troops to maintain order in LaBelle. They were very concerned the fast-spreading national news of the lynching would halt investment. The governor also received calls from the Hendry County Attorney because the sheriff was apparently unable to be reached by telephone. The next day Governor John Martin ordered Battery F, a company of 50 men, from nearby Arcadia to take defensive positions around town. 

Following the inquest charges were actually brought against 17 men for the murder. The community came together and paid their bonds though and by the time the state grand jury was impaneled in November.

However, what might have been a strong case against some individuals was basically lost in September of 1926 when the catastrophic Miami Hurricane hit and destroyed the economy of Florida. The Hurricane caused $100 million in damages to the state ($235 Billion in 2023 dollars) While the case was presented the grand jury did not come back with indictments. There were accusations that the State’s Attorney Guy Strayhorn did not present the correct or enough evidence. In the end, the concerns on every level about the lingering disaster made sure no one had the enthusiasm for a case that they did in May and once again there was no justice for an innocent Black man murdered by a White mob

Sources: https://lynchinginlabelle.com/index.php/overview/

https://www.newspapers.com/image/682638894/?terms=%22Henry%20Patterson%22%20&match=1

https://www.newspapers.com/image/354345031/?terms=%22Henry%20Patterson%22%20&match=1&clipping_id=124455821

https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/may/11

  

 

Birmingham, Alabama Police Break Up Anti-Segregation March Using Fire Hoses

On May 8, 1963, Sheriff Bull Conner had no sympathy for protestors and on this day ordered the fire department to use water cannons and hoses to break up the protests that had been going on for nearly a month.

In the picture is Mamie King-Chalmers, no relation to Dr. Martin Luther King, who had been protesting peacefully at a nearby park when the hoses were used. The photo is by Life Magazine Charles Moore. 

"It trapped me in the doorway," King-Chalmers said during a Detroit school visit in 2013, referring to the firehose. "The hose was so strong it damaged my hearing."

This was part of a terrible summer of violence in Birmingham

Mamie King-Chalmers died in Dec. of 2022 at the age of 81

 

Unknown Negro Murdered by Unknown Mob For Assaulting Unknown Girl

On May 4, 1900, three miles from Geneva, Alabama unknown hands took an unknown man from the sheriff’s deputies road and to the woods and hung him.

A common story in Alabama where over 300 lynchings took place in the Jim Crow era. Except there was no real reason for this murder victim to be unknown as he had appeared before a county magistrate to face charges that he had assaulted a 13-year-old girl. Also while it is possible the papers didn’t report the girl’s identity because she was a minor, that wasn’t the usual standard of the day.

The unknown negro supposedly pled guilty to the assault to the county magistrate but there was no record of a formal sentencing which was standard for one who accepted his guilt. 

The conclusion is that a reported 20-year-old male Negro, described as having “ginger skin” and no shoes was brutally murdered by a group of riders who took him from armed law enforcement, he was unknown, his murderers unknown, and his reported victim unknown. 

Sources:

 

Chicago Real Estate Board Creates Racially Restricted Covenants

 

May 4, 1921 In an example of harsh segregation and strong redlining the Chicago Real Estate Board adopted a policy of expelling any member who sold property in an existing white majority area to a Black family.

This began a larger segregation of the city where Home Owner Associations were created to enforce covenants blocking Black ownership in the majority of north Chicago neighborhoods like Hyde Park. Racial restrictive covenants, explicitly forbid the sale, transfer, or use of property to any Negros and many other ethnic groups. 

The president of the Real Estate Board, M.L. Smith stated that there were many neighborhoods beginning to develop on the South and West sides of Chicago and in Cook County for Blacks. “There are financial interests who see this immigration from the Southern states and are making plans to provide,” Smith told reporters. Smith was known though to strongly favor segregation of the races. “If you provide the places,” Smith said. “The Negroes will naturally segregate themselves and this isn’t a concern.” 

This also happened at a time when rents in the city were increasing and the great migration was putting intense pressure on the limited housing of Chicago. Many rental properties also blocked Black tenants while nearly 50,000 blacks moved into the city.

The previous year had also seen one of the most violent incidents of the “Red Summer of 1919”. The Chicago Riot lasted from July 27 to August 3rd and destroyed the homes of 2,000 Black residents. This new policy and the enforcement of it and the restrictive covenants placed a huge burden on the Blacks of Chicago, at one point 80% of Chicago had racially restricted covenants. 

Illinois State Senator Harold Kessinger had drafted two bills that would have introduced rent control and the Chicago Tenants Association greatly favored the bills and campaigned for them but could not get them passed. 

Residents of the “Black Belt” on the south side of Chicago were expected to deal with problems no White resident had, such as an average of seven people in their homes compared to an average of 4 in White homes. Many of the apartments for Black residents usually had limited plumbing with one bathroom per floor. it wasn’t until the 1948 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Shelly V. Kraemer that the restrictive covenants were outlawed.

Sources:

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/shelley_v_kraemer_(1948)#:~:text=Primary%20tabs-,Shelley%20v.,provision%20of%20the%20Fourteenth%20Amendment.

https://digitalchicagohistory.org/exhibits/show/restricted-chicago/restrictive_covenants

http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/27.html

An interruption

 Hello readers, hoping I have a few. there have been two major interruptions in my life causing a suspension of posting for a bit. I will be returning after March 17.

First off my Father-in-Law died on Feb, 10 and it is a huge impactful loss, I tried to write for a few days but there is just too much to do.

Second, my laptop died, at a minimum, it seems to be the power unit. Anyway, I can't get in so I can't get to my files. Can't really post this type of writing, reporting from my phone,

If you are a regular reader thank you

If you are any kind of follower thank you

I will be back.

1886 Anti-Chinese Convention Votes To Remove All Chinese From Idaho

 

Feb. 25, 1886, Anti-Chinese sentiment in the American West was as prominent of a characteristic, perhaps even more of one than prejudice against Native Americans.

From Denver to California to Wyoming and throughout the northwest with the China Town Massacre in Denver, Rock Springs Massacre, and others. The hatred was at all levels and forced the passage of the federal Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, much of this hate originated in competition for railroad and mining jobs but it grew because of cultural differences and perceived competition for the same jobs, this perception was hyped up by the Knights of Labor, an early labor union in Idaho.

In Idaho, Chinese immigrants made up 25-35 percent of the total population. Even then they had no power to even protect themselves, Chinese residents were not permitted to testify against whites in court and acts of violence committed against the Chinese were rarely investigated or punished. Perhaps the most extreme was the taxation, each person who was Chinese had to pay $5.00 a month to live in Idaho, approximately $160 in 2023 dollars, so an almost exorbitant amount.

On this day in 1886 representatives from across the state met in Boise to discuss what could be done to push the Chinese out, similar conventions were occurring in California and Nevada on the same day. In Idaho and California the language of resolutions was as prejudiced and bigoted as anything else ever written in the United States:

          Resolved: That we regard the Chinese among us as a mental, physical, moral, and financial evil.

          Resolved the Chinese must go

In other states, there was language stating that all methods must be based on the laws of the state and the federal government, but in Idaho, it was just resolved they must go. This was after the Federal 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act had made it impossible for anyone new to immigrate from China and since this made it impossible for many Chinese to bring in their families many returned to China, while others never saw their families again.

In Idaho, there was a two-pronged assault to remove the Chinese. They made moves in the state legislature to ensure that no one who was Chinese could own property in the state, this included property they already owned, forcing them to sell often at only 10 percent of the actual value. Also, violence against the Chinese increased with beatings and threats forcing them to move. This culminated in the 1887 Hells Canyon Massacre where 7 white horse thieves killed 34 Chinese miners and stole over $5 thousand in gold. They were brought to trial and acquitted of the massacre.

By 1910 the Chinese population of Idaho had dropped from 4,000 to less than 45. Through violence and lawful intimidation the men who gathered in Boise on this day in 1886 accomplished their goal.