In an op-ed for Bloomberg, UGA associate professor of history Stephen Mihm looked back at an early version of homegrown terrorism in the U.S. perpetuated by radical anarchists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
In an attempt to overthrow capitalism and the state, Mihm wrote, radicals used “readily available” dynamite and other explosives in terroristic attacks. Media hysteria ensued and so did a “brutal crackdown” on anarchists. The trend continued for decades, and in some major cities bombings were a regular occurrence.
“Terrorism had become such a fact of life by this time that newspapers ran articles blithely discussing the evolution of anarchist bombing techniques, which the Washington Post described in 1911 as having been ‘reduced to a science,’ ” Mihm wrote.
