Bath Massacre: America's First School Bombing (14 page)

The two apparently never acknowledged each other. Fordney headed home. Kehoe remained in front of the school, alone.
⁴¹

The morning of May 18, 1927, began with electricity. Lightning hovered over Bath during an early morning rainstorm, piercing the sky with occasional crackling bolts. It was a good spring shower, the kind that cleanses the land and refreshes crops.

As day broke, electricity was crossing the sky in a different form. Linemen, resembling steeplejacks shimmying up church spires, climbed wooden poles planted along Clark Road. Ropey black wires were strung along the tops of the poles, bearing the promise of cheap and plentiful power on demand courtesy of Michigan’s Consumers Power Company. This promised an enormous change for the rural town. Some homes— such as Kehoe’s—used a generator for electricity. Public buildings—including the Bath Consolidated School—also used generators. There was a public generator in town as well for some of the other buildings, although it wasn’t reliable. That was the problem with generators. Even the best of them had to be nursed like newborn kittens, constantly fed and watched over to make sure they maintained healthy purrs.

The men on the poles represented a new dawn. The instantaneous bright lights of the Roaring Twenties were—at last—coming to Bath.

Beneath the Consolidated School building, electricity was in limbo. The well pump, which provided water to the school, was acting up. Frank Smith was expecting the repairman, a Mr. Harrington, but didn’t know what time he was coming.
¹

Harrington was a real character. He only had one arm, and for fun he liked to grab a student now and again, hold the victim between his stump and rib cage, and give a wicked head rub using his only hand.
²

Figuring it would be a few hours before Harrington arrived to fix the pump, Smith didn’t want to fire up the generator just yet. The school would have to make do without power this morning.
³

The near-future of Kehoe’s farm was dependent on electricity as well, though it would have to wait a little longer to unleash. There was business to attend to first. Shortly after daybreak, Kehoe loaded a package into his truck and drove to town. It was urgent that the package—an old packing crate cut down to size, loaded with some kind of material, and sealed tight—be sent this morning to Clyde B. Smith, a Lansing insurance man. The two had a working relationship through the school board: Smith’s agency was responsible for the six-thousand-dollar surety bond on Bath Consolidated, which Kehoe had posted after he was elected treasurer.

From his farm it was a quick drive into town. Kehoe parked his machine in front of the post office. The building had yet to open for the day. With no desire to waste time, Kehoe carried his package over to the nearby railway depot and arranged for a morning delivery to Lansing. The box could be sent express rail via the next train to Laingsburg, and from there it would go out on the first train to Lansing. The stencil noting the box’s original contents apparently made little impression on D. B. Huffman, the railway agent.

The simple black letters read, “High Explosives. Dangerous.”
⁴

Albert Detluff was also in town at this early hour, having just picked up some duck’s eggs from a nearby farm. He knew about Smith’s situation with the pump and wanted to check out the problem for himself. Seeing Kehoe walking to his truck, Detluff called out and drove his machine over to his fellow school board trustee.

The two men engaged in idle talk, the kind of banter that one takes for granted in the moment but becomes strangely significant in stark
hindsight. Detluff asked Kehoe when the next board meeting was. Either the nineteenth or the twentieth, Kehoe replied. Detluff mentioned that there were problems with the well at the school and would Kehoe mind joining him to take a quick look?

Kehoe got in his truck and drove to the schoolhouse as Detluff followed in his own car. When they arrived, Kehoe told Detluff he remembered that the school board meeting was this Friday, the twentieth. As they walked into the building, Kehoe checked his watch: 8:25. It was almost time for school to begin, he pointed out, probably not enough time to look at the pump. No, Detluff insisted, the time was really 7:25. Kehoe kept his watch on Eastern Time and Detluff on Central, which was how the school clocked its day. “We have plenty of time,” Detluff said.

Kehoe hesitated for a moment. “Yes, we have,” he replied.

The two looked over the pump, reached no conclusion, and moved on to the generator. Smith, who had been at the school since six that morning, was fiddling with the oil burners. More small talk rattled through the air as Detluff and Smith theorized about what the problem with the pump could be.

Kehoe, seemingly remote just a moment before, suddenly came to life. “You know, I’m in an awful hurry!” he snapped. He abruptly exited the generator room, leaving the problem for Detluff and Smith to solve.

They ignored Kehoe’s outburst and concentrated on the generator and pump. “If I thought Mr. Harrington would be down here to fix this within a couple of hours, I wouldn’t start this up,” Smith told Detluff.

“Let’s go out and see if we can see him,” the trustee replied.

The two men went outside to see if the repairman was in sight. Detluff noticed that Kehoe’s machine was gone.
⁵

At the Cushman house, seven-year-old Ralph was almost ready to leave for school. This was no easy task. With summer vacation beginning in just two days, it was hard for the energetic boy to contain his excitement. How would he be able to sit still for his teacher when his thoughts inevitably were drifting to the school-free days of June? Ralph was poised on three months devoted to nothing but his one great love, baseball. Why, even before this day started, Ralph had managed to get in a little baseball time. Chances were he’d think of nothing else until the school bell set him free at day’s end.

Finally, he gave in to the inevitable. Just before leaving the house, he paused. “Good-bye, Mama,” he called out. “I’ll be good!”
⁶

His older sister Josephine, who had six years on her brother, walked Ralph to school. When they arrived she offered to sit with him. Josephine knew what a bashful kid Ralph was, and maybe he’d like some company until it was time to go to class.

“No!” Ralph said. Nothing could be more embarrassing than having the other children see him with his older sister.

“Okay,” Josephine replied, “that’s all right. I’ll see you at lunchtime.”
⁷

Like he did every morning, Robert Harte, an energetic nine year old, fed the chickens on the family farm. This was no small task since the Hartes had a brood of around twenty-two hundred birds. When he finished, Robert grabbed his lunch bucket and took off for school. His mother, Florence, looked fondly after him as he ran off. “See you later, Mom!” he yelled over his shoulder.
⁸

Over at the Bauerle house, Henry and his wife Hertha were getting ready to go shoe shopping in Lansing with their two oldest children, Herbert and Esther. Arnold, their mathematically minded third grader, desperately wanted to join the family. He’d been laid up with whooping cough for some time but finally was feeling like his regular self. A drive to Lansing certainly was more promising than a day in school. But no, his parents decided, Arnold had missed enough classes because of his illness. Go to school today. There would be more trips to Lansing.
⁹

At the Hart residence, twelve-year-old Iola kissed her mother good-bye as she did every morning. “Don’t worry if I don’t come home at noon,” she teased. “You know I have to write tests this morning and I might faint away.”

Lilacs were blooming. Iola picked a bouquet on the way to school.
¹⁰

So it was throughout the area. At the Bergan home. The Chapmans, the Claytons, the Ewings, the McFarrens, the MacDonalds, the Smiths, the Witchells, and the Zimmermans. The Babcocks, the Burnetts, the Englands, the Fultons. The Hobarts, the Komms, the Kings. The Perrones, the Reasoners, the Reeds, the Sages. The Stebletons, the Wilsons, and the Zavistoskis. Scenes of mundane, utter normalcy played out in countless ways.

With the school generator out, Principal Floyd Huggett relied on a gong bell attached to a chain to call the students to order. Only twenty-six years old and with the school for the past four years, Huggett undertook his duties with the professionalism of an administrator twice his age. He rang the bell at 8:30 Central Time, then went to the Bath Methodist Church next door, where the commencement was scheduled to take place the next day, to meet some students for a graduation rehearsal. Seniors were in the midst of final examinations, so not all of the young people were in class that morning. The early morning hour was perfect for fine-tuning last minute details.

Huggett met Bertha Kumm and Thelma Cressman. Thelma read three stanzas of a poem she was going to deliver during the ceremony. The reading was good, but Huggett had some suggestions for her delivery. He started giving Thelma his thoughts.
¹¹

Arthur Woodman, Donald Ewing, Charley Haveling, and William Robb, senior boys, gathered in front of the school. Free from the worries of exams for the moment, they grabbed a baseball and played an impromptu game.

Charley was pitching to Arthur, who stood about twenty feet away. The throw went high, sending Arthur on a wild chase. He was determined to catch the ball.
¹²

Ten-year-old Lee Mast, a fifth grader, didn’t want to go to school that morning. His hip hurt for some reason; he must have slept on it funny. That excuse didn’t wash with his mother, and off to school he went.

His teacher, Blanche Hart, asked Lee to run an errand for her. Any excuse to get out of class was a good one, and he gladly took on this special assignment. As he walked down the hall, Lee felt a nice breeze wafting into the building through the windows.
¹³

Leona Gutekunst, the second-grade teacher, was just about finished reading a story to her class. Miss Gutekunst had a real gift for reading aloud. Stories seemed to come to life whenever she opened a book. Some of the second graders were seated at a round table with Miss Gutekunst; the others spilled onto the floor at her feet.

After completing the tale, Miss Gutekunst told the children it was time for something else. No, her students begged, just one more story, please. Their minds certainly weren’t on their lessons, what with summer
vacation about to start. Well, why not? One more story wouldn’t hurt. For the moment, the students wouldn’t have to return to their desks along the west side of the classroom.
¹⁴

Willis Cressman, now in the tenth grade, thought he’d go to the school library and catch up on some reading. A teacher stood in the doorway and refused to let Cressman in. He was puzzled by this, but figured he’d go to the assembly room study hall and get things done there instead.
¹⁵