Blast from the Past

All that’s left are nine picture frames hanging forlornly on a wall at the Milwaukee police administration building. Today, few know anything about the faces on that wall. But until the infamous Sept. 11 attacks, the record for most American police killed on duty in a single incident belonged to Milwaukee.

On Nov. 24, 1917, at 7:33 p.m., a bomb exploded in the Central Police Station at Broadway and Wells. It killed nine officers and two civilians. The horrific event came more by chance than criminal ingenuity.

The story begins with August Giuliani, a defrocked priest who became a Methodist minister and a strong advocate for the Protestant faith. He exhorted fellow Italian immigrants to support World War I, much to the chagrin of many of them.

On Sept. 9, 1917, Giuliani decided to lecture in front of an anarchist clubhouse, a hotbed of anti-war fervor. People began heckling him, and when the crowd got unruly, police opened fire, killing two and injuring several others. Eleven rioters were arrested. Some radicals charged the police were there to do Giuliani’s bidding and mow down those who opposed his pro-war views. For two months, the anarchists bided their time, planning their revenge.

On the morning of Nov. 24, the day before the trial was to start for the rioters, 10-year-old Josie Spicciatti discovered a 20-pound package. It was in a narrow passage next to the Italian Evangelical Church on Van Buren, where Giuliani was the preacher. The girl’s mother, the cleaning lady, took the package, but waited until that afternoon to inform Maude Richter, a church worker who later married Giuliani. Richter dragged it to the church basement, “banging it on the steps along the way,” according to newspaper reports, and then began taking the device apart. Upon realizing it was a bomb, she reassembled it and had the church janitor take it to the police.

It was met mostly with skepticism. Capt. John T. Sullivan likened it to a “big dinner pail.” Sgt. Henry Deckert took it to Lt. Robert Flood’s office, saying, “Look at this new kind of bomb I’ve got!” Flood yelled not to fool around with it, so Deckert went to the squad assembly room, where more detectives examined it.

Then it exploded.

The blast engulfed the station, ripping through windows, walls and men. So destructive was it that Sgt. Deckert could only be identified by the stripe on his pants. Edward Spindler, who operated a second-floor switchboard, was killed by shrapnel that came up through the floor. One officer’s wedding ring was blown off. Another’s watch was found on a windowsill, its hands stopped at 7:33 p.m.

The incident gained national headlines. The perpetrator was never caught, though the likely suspect was an open secret in the anarchist movement. Emma Goldman, a noted radical, and others identified the bomber as Mario Buda (aka Mike Boda), an Italian anarchist who skipped town shortly after the explosion and who was responsible for similar acts, notably the Wall Street explosion of 1920.

Police records back then were haphazard, so birth dates, photos and marital status of some slain officers are unavailable. Today, all that remains of one of the most devastating acts of terrorism of its time are nine picture frames – some with photos and others with sketches of crosses where no photo could be found.