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History on Terrorism on Wall Street; 1920-September-16
Topic Started: Aug 12 2006, 04:30 AM (316 Views)
Axtremus
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HOLY CARP!!!
[URL=http://www.h-net.org/~hns/articles/2001/091701a.html
 
http://www.h-net.org/~hns/articles/2001/091701a.html[/URL] ]

By Beverly Gage
...
The attack occurred on September 16, 1920, at the corner  of Wall and Broad streets, the hub of American capitalism.  Just after noon, as workers poured onto the street for their  lunchtime breaks, a horse-drawn cart exploded into the crowd. "It was a crash out of a blue sky," one witness  wrote, "an unexpected, death dealing bolt which in a  twinkling turned into a shamble the busiest corner of  America's financial center." By the next day, more than 30  people were dead, and within a month a total of 40 people lost their lives.

...

Responsibility for the blast, however, was never determined. For the authorities and for the American public,  failure to find the perpetrators was a major embarrassment.  But it was also a triumph. In the midst of the post-World   War I Red Scare, when anarchists and communists were  routinely deprived of their civil rights, the Wall Street  investigation did not, against all odds, produce a  scapegoat.

The blast did, however, result in serious consequences  for American democracy. Fear of further violence boosted  nativist campaigns for immigration restriction, which  discriminated against groups -- Italians, Russians, Jews -- suspected of harboring radical ideas.

The explosion also solidified national support behind  Wall Street, transforming the daily routine of finance into  an act of defiance and patriotic affirmation. Critics of the  country's economic system were denounced for supporting violence and terror, and debate over Wall Street's power  grew noticeably more muted. It was in such silences, rather  than in shouting, that the attack had its most profound  national effect.

Wall Street itself, eager to minimize fears of a stock  market crash, swiftly returned to "business as usual." The  New York Stock Exchange opened at its normal time on the  next day, September 17, and the market continued the  previous day's upward climb. By September 20, the New York Commercial could report that "There is unmistakably a better  feeling in Wall Street than there has been for some time."  The violence was dismissed as the work of crazed revolutionists.


...


[URL=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall_Street_Bombing
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wall_Street_Bombing[/URL] ]

The Wall Street bombing was a terrorist incident that occurred at 12:05 pm on September 16, 1920 in the Financial District of New York City. It was the deadliest bomb attack on American soil for seven years, until the Bath School disaster. 33 were killed and 400 persons were injured by the blast.


Shortly before the bomb went off a warning note had been placed in a mailbox at the corner of Cedar Street and Broadway. The warning read:

Remember we will not tolerate any longer. Free the political prisoners or it will be sure death for all of you. American Anarchists Fighters.

...
No charges were ever filed in the bombing. Anarchists were suspected, especially followers of Luigi Galleani, and persecution of Eastern European and Sicilian immigrants increased after the attack. Investigators searched hundreds of stables to find who sent the horse, but nothing was uncovered. Despite vows that the police would catch the perpetrators, the FBI rendered the file inactive in 1940 and the crime remains unsolved to this day.
...

Trading was closed for the afternoon of Sep.16, but promptly re-opened the next morning, and the market climbed 7% within the month from that point.

I'm particularly struck by the four italicized paragraphs quoted from the first article by Beverly Gage, and contrast and as parallel to what we've observed as the nation and the citizenry's reaction to 9/11.
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The 89th Key
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Cool info, Ax. Thanks!
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ivorythumper
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I am so adjective that I verb nouns!
I suspect the Barge set off the bomb to spur the economy.
The dogma lives loudly within me.
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David Burton
Senior Carp
ivorythumper
Aug 12 2006, 09:23 AM
I suspect the Barge set off the bomb to spur the economy.

No proof of course. But if anyone bothered to really dig and found anything even remotely plausible, rest assured it would not succeed without proper academic plumage. If such information ever came out in some academic journal, confirming a Barge connection; a conspiracy hatched by foreigners funding American based anarchists (deluded useful idiots), then rest assured it is authorized Barge publicity. If not, then surely the "lone nut" scenario would do. It is interesting though to note what effects the event did have at the time and for what purposes. Populations will be motivated by the fear of violence as much as actual violence itself.
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jon-nyc
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Cheers
If you look closely you can still see marks from the bombing on the old JP Morgan building, 23 wall street, across form the exchange.
In my defense, I was left unsupervised.
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jon-nyc
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Cheers
indeed google had a pic:

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In my defense, I was left unsupervised.
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kentcouncil
Fulla-Carp
A digression, but jon's photo reminded me of this:

The Toronto Stock Exchange has an art deco stone frieze carved above its doors, showing a progression of people representing different segments of the economy. No one quite knows if it was the designer's intention or not, but it looks like the businessman has slipped his hand into the workman's pocket...

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It was a confusion of ideas between him and one of the lions he was hunting in Kenya that had caused A. B. Spottsworth to make the obituary column. He thought the lion was dead, and the lion thought it wasn't.

- P.G. Wodehouse
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