Why the Government Dropped a Bomb on Philadelphia Residents

On May 13th, 1985, the United States government bombed its own citizens on live TV, destroying 61 homes and killing American men, women, and children in the process.

That morning, 500 police officers had surrounded a single row house in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Its occupants were given 15 minutes to come outside and surrender.

But when the 15 minutes had passed and no one had come out, the neighborhood became a battlefield.

Explosives ripped through walls, water cannons tore in through the freshly made holes, and police officers with shotguns, sniper rifles, M16s, and even submachine guns unleashed over 10,000 rounds on a family home that had children inside.

And still, the people inside refused to come out.

So, the government made a decision no American leadership had ever made before.

To drop a bomb on a family home in the middle of a residential neighborhood.

What was it about this house and the people living there that could possibly warrant the amount of force? They were a group of activists led by a man named Vincent Leapheart.

Drafted into the Korean War, Vincent witnessed horrors that never left him.

The destruction of innocent people, animals, and the land itself.

By the time he returned home in 1954 with an honorable discharge, everything he had seen had deeply affected him.

He began traveling, teaching himself global politics, and searching for a better way to live.

He took in the ideas of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Gandhi, believing in fighting back against oppression rather than fleeing.

He rejected organized religion outright, calling it a tool to keep people chained.

In the late 1960s, Vincent returned to Philadelphia.

but home wasn't what it should have been.

The school system was broken, housing crumbled, black residents were denied jobs, gangs filled the void, and police brutality went unchecked.

The man who oversaw it all was Philadelphia's mayor, Frank Rizzo.

Before politics, he was a cop, and from his own words, you could tell what kind of cop he was.

Break their heads, they try to break yours, you break theirs first.

Rizzo rose through the ranks to become police commissioner in 1967, and his aggressive policing style was clear almost immediately.

During a protest outside Girard College, a boarding school that admitted only poor, orphaned white boys, demonstrators gathered calling for equal access for black children.

Deputy Commissioner Rizzo was there with hundreds of officers, holding the line.

According to Kenneth Salaam, also known as Freedom Smitty, who was there at the protest, the second week Rizzo ordered the cops to get on their motorcycles and run into us and run us over.

On May 13th, 1985, the United States government bombed its own citizens on live TV, destroying 61 homes and killing American men, women, and children in the process.

That morning, 500 police officers had surrounded a single row house in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Its occupants were given 15 minutes to come outside and surrender.

But when the 15 minutes had passed and no one had come out, the neighborhood became a battlefield.

Explosives ripped through walls, water cannons tore in through the freshly made holes, and police officers with shotguns, sniper rifles, M16s, and even submachine guns unleashed over 10,000 rounds on a family home that had children inside.

And still, the people inside refused to come out.

So, the government made a decision no American leadership had ever made before.

To drop a bomb on a family home in the middle of a residential neighborhood.

What was it about this house and the people living there that could possibly warrant the amount of force? They were a group of activists led by a man named Vincent Leapheart.

Drafted into the Korean War, Vincent witnessed horrors that never left him.

The destruction of innocent people, animals, and the land itself.

By the time he returned home in 1954 with an honorable discharge, everything he had seen had deeply affected him.

He began traveling, teaching himself global politics, and searching for a better way to live.

He took in the ideas of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Gandhi, believing in fighting back against oppression rather than fleeing.

He rejected organized religion outright, calling it a tool to keep people chained.

In the late 1960s, Vincent returned to Philadelphia.

but home wasn't what it should have been.

The school system was broken, housing crumbled, black residents were denied jobs, gangs filled the void, and police brutality went unchecked.

The man who oversaw it all was Philadelphia's mayor, Frank Rizzo.

Before politics, he was a cop, and from his own words, you could tell what kind of cop he was.

Break their heads, they try to break yours, you break theirs first.

Rizzo rose through the ranks to become police commissioner in 1967, and his aggressive policing style was clear almost immediately.

During a protest outside Girard College, a boarding school that admitted only poor, orphaned white boys, demonstrators gathered calling for equal access for black children.

Deputy Commissioner Rizzo was there with hundreds of officers, holding the line.

According to Kenneth Salaam, also known as Freedom Smitty, who was there at the protest, the second week Rizzo ordered the cops to get on their motorcycles and run into us and run us over.