Forensic sketch of the Unabomber
|
Unabomber Facts: Fast Fact Sheet
Fast, fun facts and Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ's)
about the Unabomber.
What does Unabomber mean? The word 'Unabomber'
derived from the title UNABOM (from "UNiversity
& Airline BOMber") that the FBI used to
refer to the case. The code word 'Unabomber'
was coined by the media to describe the
unknown anarchist and murderer.
What did the Unabomber do? The Unabomber
committed sixteen mail bomb attacks on
universities and airlines during his reign
of terror that resulted in three fatalities How
long was
the Unabomber at large? The elusive
figure known at the Unabomber operated for
nearly 18 years (1978 to 1995) before he was
captured. The Unabomber
Sketch: The Unabomber sketch was drawn
by Forensic artist Jeanne Boylan from the
description made by a woman in Utah who had
caught a fleeting glimpse of the Unabomer in
1987.
Who was the Unabomber?
The identity of the American anarchist known
as the Unabomber was Ted Kaczynski, a
Harvard graduate who became a UC Berkeley
professor with a PhD in mathematics.
Unabomber
Facts for kids
The following fact
sheet contains interesting facts and information on
Ted Kaczynski, known as the Unabomber.
Ted
Kaczynski: Unabomber
Facts for kids
Unabomber
Facts - 1: For nearly
eighteen years, 1978 to 1995, from the identity of
the terrorist known as the Unabomber was unknown. During
this time the Unabomber mailed, or hand-delivered, a
series of increasingly sophisticated bombs that killed
three people and injured 23 more.
Unabomber
Facts -
2: His targets were people working on
technical advancements who were affiliated with
universities and airlines.
Unabomber
Facts - 3: Before the true identity of
the Unabomber was known, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
used the title "UNABOM" (UNiversity & Airline BOMber) to refer to
his case, which resulted in the media calling him the Unabomber.
Unabomber
Facts - 4: After nearly an eighteen year
reign of terror the Unabomber was arrested on April 3, 1996.
His his identity was revealed as that of Ted Kaczynski (born May 22,
1942), a former UC Berkeley professor who had been living a
survivalist lifestyle as a recluse in a one-room cabin in Lincoln,
Montana since 1971.
Unabomber
Facts - 5: Ted Kaczynski was born in Chicago, Illinois to a
Polish American couple, Wanda and Theodore Kaczynski. He had a
younger brother called David Kaczynski who was born October 3, 1949.
Unabomber
Facts - 6: Ted Kaczynski,
pushed by his parents to achieve academic success,
became a child prodigy, a boy genius. At the age of 16,
in 1958, he entered Harvard University where he studied
mathematics.
Unabomber
Facts - 7: Ted Kaczynski
graduated from Harvard in 1962 and went on to gain a PhD
in math at the University of Michigan. In 1967 began to
teach at the University of California, Berkeley but
suffered an emotional breakdown and abruptly resigned
just two years later.
Unabomber
Facts - 8: The behavior of
Ted Kaczynski has been described as displaying a
"solitary,'' or loner style that developed into a
schizoid personality disorder. His personality
described as unsociable, suspicious, arrogant, guarded,
apprehensive, argumentative and uncompromising. He
always saw the worst in others, never trusted anyone and
firmly believed that he was always right.
Unabomber
Facts -
9: In 1971 Ted Kaczynski adopted a
solitary lifestyle, living in a small, primitive cabin
in Lincoln, Montana. He spent his time hunting and
reading and began to develop his own anti-technology and
anti-government philosophy.
Unabomber
Facts - 10: In 1978 he
returned to civilization for four months, working in a
foam-cutting factory with his brother David, a graduate
of Columbia College of Columbia University. Ted
Kaczynski was fired from the after allegedly harassing
co-worker with whom he had a brief, unsuccessful
relationship.
Unabomber
Facts -
11: Feeling inadequate
and rejected Ted Kaczynski returned to his solitary
lifestyle in Lincoln, Montana. The first Unabomber
bombing, occurred on May 26, 1978.
Unabomber
Facts - 12: May 26, 1978: The bomb was
first sent to the University of Illinois at Chicago but was returned
to an address at Northwestern University in Evanston. The mail bomb
detonated when Northwestern campus police officer Terry Marker
opened it, suffering minor injuries.
Unabomber
Facts - 13: May 9, 1979: A pipe bomb was
placed in a room at Northwestern University. A Northwestern graduate
student, John Harris, picked up the bomb, and it exploded inflicting
minor cuts and burns.
Unabomber
Facts - 14: At this stage
there was no apparent connections between the bombings
which were treated as separate cases and not the work of
a single bomber.
Unabomber
Facts - 15: November 15, 1979:
A bomb, disguised as a parcel mailed from Chicago,
caught fire in a mailbag aboard a Boeing 727 on American
Airlines Flight 444, Chicago to Washington, D.C. Twelve
passengers were treated for smoke inhalation. The fire
forced an emergency landing at Dulles Airport, near
Washington.
Unabomber
Facts - 16: In late 1979, an FBI-led task
force that included the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF)
and U.S. Postal Inspection Service was formed to investigate the
“UNABOM” case.
Unabomber
Facts - 17: June 10, 1980:
United Airlines President, Percy A. Wood, suffered cuts
and burns after detonating a bomb in package, disguised
as a book, at Lake Forest, Illinois. A week before the
incident Percy Wood had received a letter, signed
"Enoch W. Fisher" informing him that he would soon
be receiving a book of social significance. The initials
"FC" were found etched on a piece of pipe from the bomb.
Unabomber
Facts - 18: Similarities
between the first four bombs showed that a homemade
"initiator" was used in each device, that the soldering
work was clumsily-done and that all of the wood used in
the devices was of low quality.
Unabomber
Facts - 19: October 8, 1981: A
student and maintenance worker found a pipe bomb in a
university computer mainframe room at the University of
Utah, Salt Lake City. The device was defused and no one
was injured. The bomb also contained another reference
to "FC".
Unabomber
Facts -
20: May 5, 1982: A
parcel addressed to Professor Patrick Fischer, the head
of the computer science department at Vanderbilt
University, Nashville, Tennessee exploded, injuring his
secretary, Janet Smith.
Unabomber
Facts -
21: July 2, 1982:
Engineering Professor, Diogenes J. Angelako, picked up
what he believed was a can, left in a common room in the
computer science building at the University of
California, Berkeley. Professor Angelakos was seriously
injured by the pipe-bomb explosion. The bomb was marked
"FC".
Unabomber
Facts -
22: The mail bombs
were becoming more powerful and sophisticated with each
attack and the FBI investigators were beginning to build
a profile of the serial 'Unabomber'. The components used
in the devices were all hand made and it was therefore
impossible to trace their source. A period of nearly
three years elapsed before the next 'Unabomber' mail
bomb attack in 1985.
Unabomber
Facts -
23: May 15, 1985: A
graduate student, John E. Hauser, picked up a package in
the computer science lab at the University of
California, Berkeley. John E. Hauser triggered an
explosion that caused him to lose four fingers from his
right hand. The device was more sophisticated than the
previous devices. The Unabomber used metal caps on the
pipe bomb, as opposed to the less destructive wooden
caps used in previous devices.
Unabomber
Facts -
24: June 13, 1985: A suspicious package
mailed to Boeing Aircraft Company, Auburn, Washington
was opened but did not explode and was safely disarmed.
Unabomber
Facts -
25: November 15, 1985:
Research assistant Nicklaus Suino suffered burns and
shrapnel wounds when he opened a package bomb at the
home of professor James V. McConnell a biologist and
animal psychologist, at Ann Arbor, Michigan. The
professor suffered a hearing loss as a result of the
bomb explosion.
Unabomber
Facts -
26: December 11, 1985:
The Unabomber claimed his first fatality. Hugh C.
Scrutton was killed when he tried to remove what looked
to be a road hazard, but was actually a bomb, in the car
park behind his computer rental shop in Sacramento,
California.
Unabomber
Facts -
27: February 20, 1987:
Gary Wright the owner of CAAMS Inc, Salt Lake City, Utah
spotted the device in his parking place at the rear
entrance of his computer shop. Gary Wright got out of
his car and kicked the device which exploded, severing a
nerve in his arm.
Unabomber
Facts -
28: A secretary
witnessed the February 20. She saw a man with a hooded
sweatshirt and aviator sunglasses leave the bag at the
CAAMS Inc. car park. A sketch of the Unabomber was drawn
by Forensic artist Jeanne Boylan from the description of
the eyewitness.
Unabomber
Facts -
29: The description
and sketch of the Unabomber was put into circulation and
the Unabomber, knowing he had been seen at CAAMS Inc.,
took a six year break from his deadly activities.
Investigations into the identity of the bomber grew cold
until 1993 when he started again.
Continued...
Ted
Kaczynski: Unabomber
Facts for kids
Facts
about the Unabomber for kids
The following fact
sheet continues with facts about Ted Kaczynski,
known as the Unabomber.
Ted
Kaczynski: Unabomber
Facts for kids
Unabomber
Facts -
30: June 22, 1993: A
mail bomb injured Dr. Charles Epstein, a geneticist at
the University of California, when he opened a package
mailed to his home in Tiburon, California.
Unabomber
Facts -
31: June 24, 1993: Two
days later, Professor David Gelerntner, a computer
scientist at Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut
received a similar package at his office. He was injured
and disfigured in the explosion when he opened the mail
package.
Unabomber
Facts -
32: Both of the
packages had been mailed on June 18, 1993 from
Sacramento, California. The Unabomber had advanced his
bomb building process and had produced more compact and
lethal bombs than he had produced in the 1970's and
1980's.
Unabomber
Facts -
33: December 10, 1994:
The Unabomber claimed his second fatality. Advertising
executive Thomas Mosser was killed in a bomb explosion
when he opened a package posted to his home in North
Caldwell, New Jersey.
Unabomber
Facts -
34: The Unabomber
later claimed that Thomas Mosser was targeted for his
public relations firm's work for Exxon Corp., the
company whose tanker caused the
Exxon Valdez oil spill
in Alaska's Prince William Sound.
Unabomber
Facts -
35: April 24, 1995:
The Unabomber claimed his third and final fatality.
Gilbert B. Murray, the president of the California
Forestry Association, was killed when a parcel bomb
exploded at the Association's office in Sacramento,
California. The mail bomb had been addressed to Mr.
Murray's predecessor, William Dennison.
Unabomber
Facts -
36: On June 28, 1995
the New York Times and the Washington Post received
letters from a person, claiming to be from an
anarchist group called Freedom Club "FC." The letters
were mailed from Sacramento just before the explosions
that injured Dr. Charles Epstein and David Gelernter.
The letters included a code number to ensure that any
future communication from the FC group could be verified
as genuine.
Unabomber
Facts -
37: The letters
promised to stop the mail bomb attacks and killings if a
national newspaper would publish the FC manuscript
against industrial society, "Industrial Society and Its
Future" which became known as the "Unabomber
Manifesto",
Unabomber
Facts -
38: On September 19,
1995 the Washington Post and the New York Times
published the 35,000-word manifesto as an
eight-page supplement, which derided the corrupt
industrial-technological society, raging that the
industrial revolution has been a “disaster for the human
race” and called for a "revolution against technology".
Unabomber
Facts -
39: In the "Unabomber
Manifesto" the following phrase was included:
"As for the
negative consequences of eliminating industrial society
- well, you can’t eat your cake and have it too
- to gain one thing you have to sacrifice another.”
Unabomber
Facts -
40: The publication of
the "Unabomber Manifesto" led to the downfall of the
Unabomber and the discovery of his true identity as Ted
Kaczynski.
Unabomber
Facts -
41: David Kaczynski
saw the "Unabomber Manifesto" in his morning paper and
recognized the writing style and phrasing. The Unabomber
had made the "correct" use of the idiomatic phrase "You
can't eat your cake and have it, too," instead of the
usual form, which is "You can't have your cake and eat
it, too."
Unabomber
Facts -
42: The correct
phrasing of "You can't eat your cake and have it, too"
was a family habit picked up from their mother and this,
together with his bizarre lifestyle and extreme views,
convinced David that the Unabomber was his brother Ted
Kaczynski.
Unabomber
Facts -
43: David Kaczynski
reluctantly informed the FBI of his suspicions and
provided old family letters demonstrating Ted
Kaczynski’s writing style. The FBI passed the
information to their Behavioral Analysis Unit and
forensic linguistics experts to compare the "Unabomber
Manifesto" to other pieces of writing Ted Kaczynski had
given to his family.
Unabomber
Facts -
44: This FBI
information convinced a judge to submit a search
warrant. On April 3, 1996, Ted Kaczynski was arrested by
the FBI at his cabin deep in the woods of Lincoln,
Montana. His cabin contained one completed bomb, bomb
parts, and about 40,000 pages of his journals and
diaries, in which he described his crimes in detail.
Unabomber
Facts -
45: In January 1998, Ted Kaczynski
attempted suicide as he prepared to go on trial. He
refused to allow his lawyers to use any type of insanity
defense and pleaded guilty to 13 bomb related charges.
Unabomber
Facts -
46: Ted Kaczynski was found guilty and
sentenced to eight life sentences without the
possibility of parole.
Unabomber
Facts -
47: For a time Ted Kaczynski shared a cell block that is commonly referred to as
"Bombers Row" with
Ramzi Yousef, the 1993 World Trade
Center bomber and Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols
the Oklahoma City Bombers.
Ted
Kaczynski: Unabomber
Facts for kids
Ted
Kaczynski, the
Unabomber - Acts of Terror
For facts about
terrorist attacks on the US homeland refer
to:
Ted
Kaczynski, the
Unabomber - President Bill Clinton Video
The article on the Unabomber provides detailed facts and a summary of one of the important events during his presidential term in office. The following
Bill Clinton video will
give you additional important facts and dates about the political events experienced by the 42nd American President whose presidency spanned from January 20, 1993 to January 20, 2001.
Ted
Kaczynski, the Unabomber
●
Interesting Facts about Unabomber for kids and schools
●
Key historical events
and Unabomber for kids
●
Facts about the Unabomber
●
Facts about Ted Kaczynski, the
Unabomber
●
Fast, fun, interesting
Unabomber
about major events
● History Timeline of Ted Kaczynski,
the Unabomber
● Bill Clinton Presidency and
Unabomber for schools,
homework, kids and children |