In the early hours of August 24, 1970, anti-war terrorists exploded a truck bomb next to Sterling Hall at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, killing a physics researcher who was staying late to finish an experiment. I was awakened from my sleep in my rented room near Monroe Street, about a mile from campus, by the sound of the blast and its echo, but soon fell asleep and did not learn of the explosion until I tried to go to work the next morning.

Their target was the Army Math Research Center, which was in Sterling Hall, but the Department of Physics occupied the bottom of the building and the Department of Astronomy was on the fifth and sixth floors. The flames in this photo are coming from the office of Michael Molnar, one of the astronomy graduate students. He lost his thesis in the blast. My office was on the opposite side of the building. My work did not suffer any major losses, but it was a long time before we were able to get into the building again.


Sterling Hall still in flames

Damage seen in daylight
TBD TBD

These images were copied from a Wisconsin State Journal site in 2020. They have lower resolution than 300 dpi.

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