Boom! A bomb in Norwood! by Bob Davies
Date: c. 1940
I think the whole idea must have been Jim's. He worked part-time at a drug store. He had learned from somewhere that the formula for gunpowder was equal parts of sulphur, niter (sodium nitrate, or saltpeter) and charcoal, and he wanted to make a bomb. His 'sticky' fingers had picked up small containers of sulphur and niter, but we had no charcoal...
To get the missing third ingredient, charcoal, we gathered a number of newspapers and burned them page after page, carefully saving all of the pieces. After we had amassed a pile of burnt paper, we crushed it by rubbing it in our hands. That was how we got our necessary charcoal.
Our bomb casing was a piece of two-inch pipe about twelve inches long. It had a cap screwed onto one end. Where it came from I don't know, but probably Jim had most to do with that too. Our fuse was to be a wooden match inserted head first into a small hole drilled into the side of the pipe. I'm guessing now that we must have used Mr. Riddle's drill to make this hole. As I mentioned earlier, he was frequently working on his car in his driveway, and he had lots of tools.
We mixed our three ingredients and poured the mixture into the open end of the pipe. Not having another cap to screw onto that end, we hammered the end shut as tight as we could.
Our test area was the vacant lot about half a block west of Riddle's yard, on the north side of the lane, across from Rendall's lumberyard... McGavin's Bakery had built on this site back in 1914, but the building had been long since demolished at the time of our use of the site. There were still some concrete foundations sticking upright out of the ground about a foot and a half, and also some large slabs of concrete resting at a slant over the tops of some of those upright sections. Also on the site, but about 100 feet further west, some neighbouring kids had dug a large hole, covered it with planks and dirt and grass clumps, and had made a cave or bunker to play in.
Our hastily-devised plan was to place our 'bomb' under one of the sloping concrete slabs, light the fuse, stand well back, and, although we didn't know the kids and had no animosity towards them, to scare any of them that might still have been in the bunker at the late twilight hour. We were pretty sure that nothing would be damaged, but we had no idea of how much noise it might make, or even if it would work. One of us (I know it wasn't me) placed the 'bomb' and lit the match 'fuse'. The rest of the gang was well back at the intersection of the lanes. Our 'fuse-lighter' came back to join us. After a few minutes of nothing happening, we concluded that the fuse had gone out, and our 'fuse-lighter' had to make a second trip. That being done successfully, we again waited for the explosion. After what seemed to be a couple of minutes more, I think we had all assumed that it was either a dud or that the fuse had gone out again, when, B000000000000M!!!!! - a noise as loud as an artillery cannon firing jolted us out of our temporary stupor.
We had not planned our getaway so it was everyone for himself. I don't know what the others did but I vividly remember my actions over the next few seconds and the next few minutes. Within seconds of the blast, lights came on in all the houses; dogs started barking; people came out of their back doors; and I (and the other gang members) started running. A man who lived in a small house near the back lane came out as we were running past his house and hollered something at us. We weren't about to stop and chat with him. I quickly planned my escape route as I ran east down the lane; cut through Riddle's open back yard to the front avenue; then east a short block to the dark area of the gardens on the east side of 92nd Street, towards Clarke Stadium.
It only took me a few seconds to get to Riddle's yard. In the almost-dark evening I could see fences, garages, houses, trees, and poles, silhouetted against the black sky. I could see the clothesline pole for the west half of Riddle's duplex silhouetted against the sky. I ran past the back of the pole, cutting close to it as I made my turn into the yard, when suddenly there was another BOOM! - or so it seemed. I was lying flat on my back in the long quack-grass, looking up at the bright stars in the clear black sky. My head was spinning. I had a burning sensation in my mouth. I was momentarily stunned and unable to move.
How long I lay there I'm not sure, but not having been caught or discovered, I got to my feet and went into the yard. In a quick change of plan, I went over Riddle's east-side fence into their neighbour's fully-grown and well-hilled potato garden. I lay between two rows of potatoes for a long time trying to figure out what had happened, and what had hit me, and waited for all the excitement to die down. As I lay there feeling my bleeding lips, teeth, and gums, I realized what had actually happened. While I had been able to correctly discern the clothes-line pole in the dark, I did not see, and had forgotten about, the thin guy-wire at the back of the pole. I had run full-speed into the wire and had taken it across my mouth and lower part of my face.
After what seemed to be an eternity, and when all was quiet, I arose, went back into Riddle's yard, got my bike, and rode over to Mickey's Confectionery, on 95th Street, across from Jim Lindsay's house. A couple of the gang was still there and we recapped our various situations. I then rode to where we were living at that time, on the south side of the river at 10050-91 Avenue. I never heard much mention of all of this after that. I guess we were all too much afraid to talk about it for fear that the police might somehow become aware of us. If they had no answer, we sure weren't going to volunteer one for them.