Drake Bombing: Iowa Time Machine June 29, 1970

Iowa Time Machine ⏰: At 3:45 a.m. on June 29, 1970, Drake University was jolted by a blast that turned a quiet summer night into a scene of anxiety and damage, a reminder that the turbulence of the Vietnam era reached far beyond big-city campuses. The third blast of the summer in the greater Des Moines area, the Des Moines Police Station, Ames City Hall, and the Des Moines Chamber of Commerce were also attacked during what became known as the “summer of fear.”

The Kent State shootings on May 4, 1970, in which four students were killed and nine wounded, ignited protests on hundreds of campuses and helped make higher education a central battleground over the Vietnam War. The Drake explosion happened in a recessed area beside Harvey Ingham Hall and used high-powered dynamite that investigators believed had been stolen in the Des Moines area. No one was injured, but the blast caused major structural damage, with contemporary reports estimating losses at about $200,000 to $250,000.

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The timing mattered as much as the force of the explosion: it came in the early morning hours, when the campus was largely empty, yet it still signaled how fragile the boundary between protest and destruction had become in 1970. Those responsible were never apprehended, although many attribute the attacks to militant groups like Students for a Democratic Society.

Harvey Ingham Hall itself continued to serve Drake after the blast, and its survival gives the building a kind of historical memory that newer generations may not see at first glance. The blast at Harvey Ingham Hall remains a vivid marker of a summer when the Vietnam era’s unrest reached into the heart of Iowa. #Iowa #OTD #History #DesMoines #Drake