Bath Massacre: America's First School Bombing (25 page)

Cleo Clayton, the second grader ripped open by shrapnel, suffered throughout the afternoon. He remained agonizingly conscious from the time he was hit until his death some seven hours later.
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After Station Agent Huffman informed the authorities about Kehoe’s package, an intensive search began. Clyde Smith, the insurance agent to whom Kehoe sent the box, was notified. He said the package had not arrived and swore he had done nothing to anger Kehoe.

With deadly proof that Kehoe knew how to wire a bomb, finding that box was paramount. It could be set to go off at any time; just where and when that might happen added gravitas to the situation.

The afternoon came and went, and still the box was unaccounted for.
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Nellie and Josephine met Albert Cushman at the Community Hall.

Inside it looked like an abattoir. Blood everywhere. Puddles on the floor. Stains on dresses of the women helping to lay out bodies on chairs normally used during social events. Blood seeping through the sheets covering the dead.

The Cushman family was brought to Ralph’s body. He looked as though his head had exploded. The chin was gone. Metal slivers pricked his skin. Ralph’s body was broken, every bone it seemed.

Josephine suddenly felt a horrific jolt in her back, a pain shooting through her muscles, gripping her spine. It was excruciating, unlike anything she had ever felt.

She said nothing about it to her parents. They had enough on their minds.

When rescuers had found Ralph Cushman, the family was later told, he was still sitting at his desk with a classmate seated next to him. The two boys died together.
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The destruction of Kehoe’s farm was nearly perfect. House, tractor, farm equipment, all were destroyed by a combination of fire and explosives. An elaborate wiring system snaked throughout the farm grounds, sophisticated work that showcased Kehoe’s expertise as an electrician. Only the chicken coop remained standing.

An unexploded bomb inside the henhouse ironically demonstrated Kehoe’s talents for mechanical invention. The device resembled standard fountains used to provide drinking water to chickens. It was centered by an upside-down quart bottle filled with gasoline and tucked into a tin can. An automobile spark plug and coil intended as an ignition device were connected to the bottle, from which emanated a yarn wick. To ensure that the fire would spread, Kehoe had packed his contraption with a heavy jacket of straw. Somewhere along the line his careful wiring from the timer inside the house had failed, just like the botched timers beneath the schoolhouse.
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Shade trees in a small grove near the house had been cut around their bases, a practice known as girdling. Girdling is generally used to control overgrowth of trees; in Kehoe’s case it was clearly an act of destruction. In another area of the property, authorities found grapevines cut off but carefully put back in place so as to appear untouched.

Within the ruins of the barn was a different kind of destruction. Kehoe’s two horses—including the blind-eyed horse he’d offered to McMullen—were burned through to their skeletons. Their feet were bound with wires, effectively preventing the animals from escaping.
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At the edge of the farm, searchers found a plain wooden sign attached to a fence, Kehoe’s last angry words stenciled on the placard for all to see.

Bath was midway along the rail line between Lansing and Laingsburg, a town about nine and a half miles from the disaster. As evening approached, a cursory check was made of packages delivered but not yet picked up from the station.

The stationmaster saw a box addressed to Clyde Smith, the Lansing insurance agent, with a return address “Andrew P. Kehoe.” Apparently the Lansing destination had been misread as Laingsburg, and thus the package hadn’t been delivered to the intended recipient.

The wooden box had other words on it, markings from the crate’s original contents. They loomed large.

“High Explosives. Dangerous.”

Morse and another Michigan Secret Service member, Detective William Watkins, headed to Laingsburg where they took charge of the package. They handled it as gently as fine crystal from the moment it was picked up, put in the truck, and finally unloaded in Lansing. Every inch of road was carefully watched during the twenty-mile trip. One bad bump could be a matter of life and death. But the ride was without incident. Kehoe’s package was placed in a wide-open police yard. Plans were made to unseal the package the next day with every precaution possible put in place for diffusing a hidden bomb.
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The sounds of vehicles, thousands it seemed, were heard throughout Bath. Headlamps of cars, trucks, and motorcycles lit up the roads leading into town, choked the streets, shone mercilessly past the homes of a town in shock and despair. Gawkers from throughout Michigan were coming to take a look. Between the powerful electrical lights at the school and the countless automobile head lamps, Bath was immersed in an unnatural light.

Ralph Cushman’s body was transported from the morgue to a funeral home. Albert and Nellie wanted to be there, to spend the night, to be with their boy but instead became mired in a line of machines stretching down the roads. Traffic from emergency vehicles and gawkers was backed up for miles.

The Cushmans realized there was simply no getting to the funeral home in any decent amount of time. As darkness filled the skies, the steady beams of machine headlights cast an eerie glow.

At midnight, Albert and Nellie finally gave up, went home, and got in
bed. Josephine crawled in with them. The family, now numbering three, hung on tight as if holding each other together. “They want to protect me,” Josephine thought.
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Well into the early hours of May 19 the volunteers continued their herculean efforts. Electric lights powered by generators lit the scene as the rescue attempts continued through the night. The forms of workers cast jagged black shadows over the killing zone rubble.

Bricks and plaster were removed, piled with splintered wooden beams, roof tiles, broken glass, torn clothing, schoolbooks, children’s desks, and chalkboards.

But no more bodies were found.
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When Ava Sweet went to school on May 18, it was a bright spring morning. Her day started sitting in class, one of twenty-six students in the sixth grade. In a matter of hours she was buried in rubble, rescued, taken to a Lansing hospital, released, and sent to stay with an aunt.

As night fell, only thirteen of her classmates were alive. No one was telling her anything about her brother Dean.
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Thursday morning, May 19. The sun rose over a killing zone.

School grounds littered with vestiges of the bombing. Buckets filled with blood-soaked rags. Coats and hats, shoes and socks like broken flowers strewn across the lawn. One girl’s bloodstained coat and hat hanging from a tree limb. Schoolbooks, pages fluttering in the breeze. The inside of one book bore an anonymous student’s warning: “Whoever touches this studies at his own risk.”

There were piles of sheets, blankets, and other bedding used in triage and at the lawn morgue. Some of the bedclothes still bore dark imprints of children’s bodies.
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Rubble from the north wing anchored the scene. Women and children gathered near the ruined building in prayer vigils.
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Throughout the day people came to the school, fetching coats, hats, books, and other items pulled from the rubble. Some of the clothes and books were returned to their owners; other items were given to grieving mothers and fathers.
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Area hospitals were flooded with offers from potential donors ready to provide any aid—money, blood, skin—to the victims.
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Fig. 13. An impromptu memorial.
(Courtesy of Tim Howery.)

As Michigan’s leader, Governor Green knew all eyes would be on him during the crisis and in the days that followed. The aftermath of the bombing raised innumerable questions, all underscored by one key element: money. A community was devastated. Medical supplies were desperately needed. Some parents could not afford to pay for funerals. Rubble had to be cleared away. None of these elements were cheap.