May 18 is the anniversary of the 1927 Bath (Michigan) school disaster in which 38 children were murdered along with six adults and 55 others injured. Ardis Maude Wilson Basing, my mother, and two of her siblings were part of the explosion. William Warren Wilson, my grandfather, spent hours and hours at the site with many others searching, rescuing and laying out the dead afterward. He would never speak of it.
The tragedy was the result of a disgruntled local farmer who worked painstakingly as a janitor in the recently built three-story consolidated school for years, seeding it (and his farm) with explosives. Apparently this was in retaliation for the increased tax that funded the new building.
In Michigan this horrific event continues to be noted as survivors die or anniversary dates come up.
Mary Basing Kopp
Longmont