Bizarre School Shootings

TRIGGER WARNING: This (non-political) article discusses shootings on school property, guns, and death.

“School shootings are nothing new.”

That’s the bullshit I was trying to feed my wife recently when we somehow found ourselves in the middle of a not-so-fun convo about violence on school campuses. Graduating high school way back in 1997, I thought the first school shooting happened only two years later in Littleton, Colorado. Well, I was wrong.

I was not even close.*

A short jump onto the Alphabet engine and I found myself perusing a few lists on Wikipedia, specifically: List of school shootings in the United States (before 2000); and List of school shootings in the United States. On the prior, the list of incidents start as far *back as 1840! After spending a day with the lists and their sources, I found a few that I had to share. Please note that despite the tone, I am not condoning any of this violence; all of these stories are tragic and unjustifiable. That said, I do hope you find these moments in history as interesting(ly absurd) as I did.

Army Vet Gunned Down by Child-Gang, Grandmother

A custodian by the name of Woodrow Porter Jr, found himself at the wrong end of a gun, twice, on the Wednesday afternoon of April 26, 1978. The employee of Dunbar elementary reportedly found an 8-year old student bending the antenna of his car and “allegedly” spanked him for it. I put “allegedly” in quotes as the police couldn’t verify that this Black man… Spanked a boy for breaking the antenna of his car… In the late 70's?

Shiiit. You KNOW he lit that kid up! My question is: did Mr. Porter use the antenna to welt up some damage or did he lay his hands on the boy? That, we’ll never know. What we do know is at the end of the day’s classes, the student, his 6-year old sister, their 28-year old mother and 65-year old grandmother confronted Mr. Porter and then threatened to shoot him.

The AP reported that Mr. Porter was then shot in the chest before he wrestled the gun away from Grandma — Who somehow got the gun back via her daughter — and then shot him two more times. When the cops showed up, Grandma was sitting on the school steps and stopped them. She asked, “I’m involved in it, do you want me to stay here?” as if nothing horrific happened at all.

While I could find a bit more information on Woodrow Porter Jr, my lazy sleuthing could not even put a name to the Grandma or her kin. The AP reported she spent a night in jail, but I can’t find proof otherwise. As far as Mr. Porter Jr, I found his death certificate as well as something not mentioned in the original AP article: The dude served in the US Army. I find that worth noting as deaths reported today usually list one’s military service, and nowhere else but on the man’s tombstone, was I able to find that specific bit of info.

Headmaster, Student, and Bird Murdered. 1856

This tale involves tail…feathers as well as a gun. In Florence, Alabama, a sparrow-owning schoolmaster had found his pet bird dead at the hands of his students — after he already threatened them with DEATH if any harm had come to it.

You know, because kids have always fucked around to find out.

When the guilty student finally returned to school sometime later, he was summoned into the schoolmaster’s office and was never seen again alive. Reportedly, the schoolmaster followed through on his threats and strangled the student to death!

Bird-owners, amirite?

As if that wasn’t tragic enough, the student’s father, blinded by rage and a disgust of birds, went to the school and shot the schoolmaster dead. Because bird-owners are the worst.

Teacher Kills Father, Son Kills Teacher

Apparently, parents and teachers have been at each other’s throats waaaay before the discussion of CRT in classrooms.

Knights Ferry, California. Valentines Day, 1867.

George Cheshire, school teacher, expelled the daughter of a hot-tempered Mr. McGinnis. No word on what happened to the kid, but her dad “sent word” that he was going to go up to that school and horsewhip Mr. Cheshire. A man of his word, McGinnis came up to the school on the 15th and attacked the teacher. Cheshire reportedly owned McGuiness. McGinnis refused to stop despite Cheshire’s warnings and was put down by four bullets from the teacher’s revolver. “Soon after(I couldn’t find if that meant seconds or days)”, one of the dead man’s sons shot Cheshire above his right ear.

Out of all that, the one thing I still want to know is: What did McGinnis’ daughter do to get expulsed in the first place? I can only imagine that if her dad was the type of guy to threaten an ass-beating over her education and her brother was the type to commit a revenge-murder…. It must’ve been spicy.

The Snowball Fight to End All Snowball Fights

Finally, this doozy was reported in the Omaha Daily Bee back in 1883: a dude accidentally shoots three children with the same bullet during a snowball fight. Labeled as “Criminally Careless,” Mr. Lem Harbaugh was riding with his buddy, Mr. Shipley when they decided to join a snowball fight in-progress a the schoolhouse. Participating in the snowball fight were a number of tween-aged students that were kin to Lem’s work-buddy, Shipley. Also present were more Shipley family members who happened to be rolling through from another gig with their team of horses. When all these family members show up at the same time, hijinks apparently ensue with snowballs a’ flying.

When the visitors to the school finally decide to head up the road, a crowd of children run after them, armed with more balls of snow. And this is the part of the story that reveals that Mr. Lem Harbaugh is just built different.

While the older Shipleys are helpless to the power of packed powder pitched at them by prepubsecent punks, Harbaugh knows that the Shipley he is riding with carries a gun in the wagon. What he doesn’t know is his pal “Shooter” Shipley had modified the .45 caliber weapon to fire single-action. So when the kids come after Harbaugh, he points the gun, touches the trigger, it goes off.

Bang!

The bullet flies into the crowd, missing a few children before hitting 11-year old Mamie who was minding her own business back at the school. The projectile passes clean through her arm, and so close under the nose of a kid standing next to her, that it causes a nosebleed. From there, the bullet passes through another 11-year old’s thigh with enough power to knock over the child standing next to him.

Miraculously, no one died and after initially hoofing it, Mr. Lem “Hot Trigger” Hargbaugh turned himself in. Which was smart — half of the school children in that crowd he shot at were kin of his buddy Mr. Shipley and that clan rolled deep. Apparently, Mr. Shipley had no hard feelings about it.

I’m not trying to make light the seriousness of the violence happening in today’s schools. That said, I do hope the dates of these occurrences reflect that school shootings aren’t a new phenomena. Whether its from snowballs, a bent antenna, school expulsion or a dead bird, they’re not justified either. Let me know if you’ve been enlightened by some of this crazy history or if you knew of these stories before.

Stay Well