MOVE Bombing: The Day the Police Burned Down a Black Philly Neighborhood

(Atlanta Blackstar)  Never could one imagine the police doing this in a white neighborhood.

On May 13, 1985, the Philadelphia police engaged in a race riot when they dropped a bomb on the roof of a row house in a Black section of West Philadelphia. It was Mother’s Day, and Black mothers and children were killed that day, intentionally burned and shot to death by police. Eleven people, including five children ages 7 to 13 — all members of the radical Black liberation group MOVE — died.

In the end, 61 homes in this Black residential neighborhood were burned to the ground. Most of all, all of it was done on purpose because the officials in charge said their intent was to let the fire burn.