1995 : Unabomber manifesto published
On this day in 1995, a manifesto by the Unabomber, an anti-technology
terrorist, is published by The New York Times and Washington Post in
the hope that someone will recognize the person who, for 17 years, had
been sending homemade bombs through the mail that had killed and
maimed innocent people around the United States. After reading the
manifesto, David Kaczynski linked the writing style to that of his
older brother Ted, who was later convicted of the attacks and
sentenced to life in prison without parole. All told, the Unabomber
was responsible for murdering three people and injuring another 23.
Theodore John Kaczynski was born May 22, 1942, in Evergreen Park,
Illinois, a Chicago suburb. As a student, he excelled at math,
graduated from Harvard and received a Ph.D. in math from the
University of Michigan. In 1967, he got a teaching job at the
University of California at Berkeley, but quit two years later. In
1971, Kaczynski purchased some property in Lincoln, Montana, with his
brother. There, the future Unabomber built a small, secluded cabin
where he lived off the land as a recluse from the late 1970s until his
arrest on April 3, 1996.
In May 1978, an unmailed package was found in a University of
Illinois, Chicago, parking lot; a security guard was later injured
when he opened the package. The following year, another bomb exploded
at Northwestern University, in Evanston, Illinois, injuring one
person. In November of that same year, 12 people on an American
Airlines flight from Chicago to Washington, D.C., were treated for
smoke inhalation when a bomb in a mailbag aboard the plane caught
fire. Investigators eventually linked the three incidents, as the
bombings continued and spread around the country. In December 1985,
the owner of a computer store in Sacramento, California, was killed by
a bomb filled with nail fragments. After a similar explosion in Salt
Lake City two years later, investigators got their first eyewitness
description of the bomber after someone reported seeing a man in
aviator sunglasses and a hooded sweatshirt at the scene of the crime.
In April 1995, The New York Times received a letter from the Unabomber
stating that the killings would stop if the paper printed a
35,000-word manifesto. In September of that year, the Times and the
Post complied, and David Kaczynski eventually recognized his brother
Ted's writing as that of the Unabomber and contacted the FBI.
In January 1998, Kaczynski agreed to a plea bargain with the
government and was sentenced to life in prison.
history.com/tdih.do
1881 : President Garfield succumbs to shooting wounds
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=5357
1893 : New Zealand first in women's vote
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=5358
1955 : Peron deposed in Argentina
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=7025
1994 : U.S. forces land in Haiti
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=5359
##########################################
On this day in 1995, a manifesto by the Unabomber, an anti-technology
terrorist, is published by The New York Times and Washington Post in
the hope that someone will recognize the person who, for 17 years, had
been sending homemade bombs through the mail that had killed and
maimed innocent people around the United States. After reading the
manifesto, David Kaczynski linked the writing style to that of his
older brother Ted, who was later convicted of the attacks and
sentenced to life in prison without parole. All told, the Unabomber
was responsible for murdering three people and injuring another 23.
Theodore John Kaczynski was born May 22, 1942, in Evergreen Park,
Illinois, a Chicago suburb. As a student, he excelled at math,
graduated from Harvard and received a Ph.D. in math from the
University of Michigan. In 1967, he got a teaching job at the
University of California at Berkeley, but quit two years later. In
1971, Kaczynski purchased some property in Lincoln, Montana, with his
brother. There, the future Unabomber built a small, secluded cabin
where he lived off the land as a recluse from the late 1970s until his
arrest on April 3, 1996.
In May 1978, an unmailed package was found in a University of
Illinois, Chicago, parking lot; a security guard was later injured
when he opened the package. The following year, another bomb exploded
at Northwestern University, in Evanston, Illinois, injuring one
person. In November of that same year, 12 people on an American
Airlines flight from Chicago to Washington, D.C., were treated for
smoke inhalation when a bomb in a mailbag aboard the plane caught
fire. Investigators eventually linked the three incidents, as the
bombings continued and spread around the country. In December 1985,
the owner of a computer store in Sacramento, California, was killed by
a bomb filled with nail fragments. After a similar explosion in Salt
Lake City two years later, investigators got their first eyewitness
description of the bomber after someone reported seeing a man in
aviator sunglasses and a hooded sweatshirt at the scene of the crime.
In April 1995, The New York Times received a letter from the Unabomber
stating that the killings would stop if the paper printed a
35,000-word manifesto. In September of that year, the Times and the
Post complied, and David Kaczynski eventually recognized his brother
Ted's writing as that of the Unabomber and contacted the FBI.
In January 1998, Kaczynski agreed to a plea bargain with the
government and was sentenced to life in prison.
history.com/tdih.do
1881 : President Garfield succumbs to shooting wounds
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=5357
1893 : New Zealand first in women's vote
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=5358
1955 : Peron deposed in Argentina
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=7025
1994 : U.S. forces land in Haiti
history.com/tdih.do?action=tdihArticleCategory&id=5359
##########################################
No comments:
Post a Comment