Posted on 08/23/2025 11:27:08 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Friday marks 59 years since the tragic University of Texas Tower shooting.
On Aug. 1, 1966, a man by the name of Charles Whitman disguised himself as a janitor and carried bags of guns to the top of the UT Tower.
Whitman set up on the observation deck of the tower where he then opened fire on the people below.
“At approximately 11:53 a.m. on Aug. 1, 1966 I came within 4 feet of being shot by the tower sniper,” said Austinite Forrest Preece, who was a student during the shooting. “A gentleman standing that far to my right was actually killed. He took a fatal round.”
First Warning Weather Early Evening Forecast with Chief Meteorologist Nick Bannin (August 22, 2025)
Preece said he was eating on the drag and when they heard there was something going on outside they stepped outside. After they heard the shots fired in their direction they ran back inside for cover.
“There has not been a day in the ensuing 59 years I have not thought about it,” Preece said. “And on Aug. 1st it brings everything crashing back.”
Student project sheds light on forgotten moments of UT tower massacre Video taken during that fateful day shows students running in every direction for cover, and many were killed.
In all, 17 people were killed — and more than 30 injured by Whitman — who used multiple guns and fired off about 150 rounds.
On Friday, Preece and his wife Linda spent the day paying their respects to those who were killed by stopping by a few grave sites and the memorial on UT’s campus.
“It has made an impact on my life, and it’s one reason that I have been civically active and contributed everything I can to good causes around town. It’s because I felt like I was given a second chance at life that day,” Preece said.
The shooting ended at 1:24 p.m. when Whitman was ambushed and shot by police officers Ramiro Martinez and Houston McCoy.
It’s amazing that we can remember mass murders that just shocked the nation so many decades ago. But now there are mass murders that happen on a monthly basis that barely get a mention in the headlines before they are passed over by another mass murder.
I blame it on Whitman’s wife majoring in education. Liberal arts majors can drive someone crazy.
I remember this because I was to go to college only a few years later.
I remember crossing the campus and looking up at one of the buildings that looked out over the campus and being reminded of the story and worrying it could happen again at my campus.
The X-files did a story based on it,”Blood”. I could see that the minute I saw it. The reports from the days of that Texas shooting really impressed me, as it did others. I don’t know if it was the shock of something like that happening at at time when nothing like that happened or because of the way the reporting was, or the coverage was a lot but it really never left my mind.
No apparent mention by the media writer of the citizens who returned fire on Whitman’s position within a few minutes after he started, and kept him from killing even more people, until the cops could show up and rush his position.
“There was a rumor
About a tumor
Nestled at the base of his brain
He was sitting up there with his .36 magnum
Laughing wildly as he bagged them
Who are we to say the boy’s insane?”
Kinky Frieman - “The Ballad of Charles Whitman”
He was sitting up there for more than an hour,
Way up there on the Texas Tower
Shooting from the twenty-seventh floor. Yahoo!
He didn’t choke or slash or slit them,
Not our Charles Joseph Whitman,
He won’t be an architect no more.
Got up that morning calm and cool,
He picked up his guns and walked to school.
All the while he smiled so sweetly
And it blew their minds completely,
They’d never seen an Eagle Scout so cruel.
There was a rumor about a tumor
Nestled at the base of his brain.
He was sitting up there with his .36 Magnum
Laughing wildly as he bagged ‘em.
Who are we to say the boy’s insane ?
Some were dying, some were weeping,
Some were studying, some were sleeping,
Some were shouting “Texas # 1!”
Did you walk close to the buildings, so you weren’t out in the open?
Wasn’t there a movie where R Lee Ermey was impressing marines about shooting skills using Whitman as an example?
Never mind Full Metal Jacket
“In one scene set during basic training, Gunnery Sergeant Hartman praises the marksmanship of Whitman and Lee Harvey Oswald, saying both learned to shoot in the U.S. Marines.”
Psychotropic drug development and use really came into being in the 1950s. They turned my husband into a Jekyll and Hyde.
Read the article before claiming what it says and doesn’t say.
Sorry, It was another article I was reading, not the one the OP links to.
The government test on him? Military?
The UT Tower shooting was August 1, 1966.
“The UT Tower shooting was August 1, 1966.”
Article dated August 1, 2025.
...and that many of those citizens were students, that the under-equipped police helped civilians retrieve their rifles, and that one civilian was part of the team that stormed the observation deck and stopped the shooter.
"When Whitman began shooting, the Austin Police Department was ill-equipped for the situation. They mostly possessed only their service revolvers and shotguns, weapons that were useless when it came to long distances. If they did possess a rifle, it was because it was a personal weapon. The officers weren’t alone, though. Once bystanders realized what was going on, many ran to retrieve their own firearms and fired back at the tower. In a few instances, police officers drove people in their squad cars to purchase ammunition or to pick up rifles. Some people asked police what to do if they had a shot at the sniper. The police said that they should shoot to kill."
http://behindthetower.org/armed-civilians-and-the-ut-tower-tragedy
"...students and residents to fetch their own high-powered rifles and shoot back, helping an unprepared and outgunned police force. Some worked alone, taking position on roofs or behind bushes. Others partnered with Austin police officers, whose handguns and shotguns could not reach Whitman nearly 300 feet above. Officers even raced to gun stores to get ammo for the civilians, who were told to shoot to kill. "These guys were pretty good shots," said Bill Helmer, then a graduate student who witnessed the mayhem. "There was a lot of lead flying up there at him."
https://www.adn.com/nation-world/2016/07/31/the-loaded-legacy-of-the-university-of-texas-tower-shooting/
And then there's the story of Alan Crum, a civilian who armed up, was deputized on the way up inside the tower, and was one of the small cadre who stormed the observation deck and ended the shooter's rampage:
https://apps.texastribune.org/guns-on-campus/allen-crum-helped-stop-ut-tower-shooter-charles-whitman-republish/
No, a private doctor who got him hooked on uppers, downers, pain meds...anything that came along. The doctor would only give him refills as long as he had a standing appointment to see the doctor once a week! My husband saw the doctor once a week for at least the 20 years that I know about. If I hadn’t been such a wreck, I would have sued the son of a bitch.
The poster did not include the date of the article.
“The poster did not include the date of the article.”
That is why I posted it.
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