What was the motovation of the three labor day bombings

The Labor Day bombings in Little Rock (Pulaski County) in 1959 represented the last gasp of opposition to the desegregation of the capital city’s Central High School. Coming almost two years to the day after the Little Rock Nine’s first attempt to attend Central High, the coordinated set of explosions evinced a stark and violent reminder of the continuing racial tensions in Arkansas’s capital. The damage was limited, however, and the effort was arguably more symbolic than substantive. At the same time, the bombings highlighted the fact that, while the determined effort to resist the integration of Central High had finally been overcome—with the historic high school having opened its doors for the 1959–60 school year to a student body that included both blacks and whites—the change had not yet been universally accepted. After Central High was closed for the 1958–59 so-called Lost Year, the situation in Little Rock was still fragile, and the Labor Day bombings rocked the city. Aimed at a distinctive set of targets, the explosions damaged the school board offices, the front of the building that housed the mayor’s office, and a city-owned car that was parked in Fire Chief Gann Nalley’s driveway. The subsequent investigation into the bombing revealed that there was initially a fourth target, the office of Letcher Langford, a member of the city manager board. However, police believed that the effort to explode the bomb at Langford’s office was abandoned due to the high volume of traffic on the widely traveled road that ran between the Arkansas State Capitol and the city’s business district. The bombs were clearly intended to send a message, and the city was shocked and angered. MORE IN COMMENTS