The Bath School Disaster: America’s Deadliest School Massacre
- dthholland
- 2 hours ago
- 10 min read
“Criminals are made, not born.”
That was the message painted on a charred wooden sign left behind on the fence of Andrew Kehoe’s farm in Bath Township, Michigan. On 18 May 1927, Kehoe—once regarded as a meticulous farmer, school board treasurer, and community member—unleashed an act of mass murder that remains, nearly a century later, the deadliest attack ever perpetrated on a school in the United States. Forty-five people died. Thirty-eight of them were children.
To understand how this quiet agricultural community became the site of a mass-casualty bombing, one must go back several years—to the simmering discontent of a man who believed his misfortunes were everyone else’s fault.
Bath Township: A Community in Transition
In the early 1920s, Bath Township, located just northeast of Lansing, was a modest agricultural area. Residents had recently voted to consolidate their local rural schools into one larger institution, the Bath Consolidated School. It was a modern educational facility, praised for its innovation, but not everyone shared in the enthusiasm. The decision brought with it higher property taxes, and with only 300 adult residents, the tax burden was acutely felt.
Among those who felt it most bitterly was Andrew Philip Kehoe, a 55-year-old farmer and electrical engineer by training. Kehoe had moved to Bath with his wife Nellie in 1919, purchasing a 185-acre farm. Outwardly, he was known for his tidiness and helpfulness. But neighbours also remembered a man with a volatile temper, who once beat a horse to death and was suspected of deliberately sabotaging an oil stove that killed his stepmother.
The Making of a “Dangerous Injustice Collector”
Kehoe’s grievances accumulated over the years. He opposed school taxes vehemently, frequently sparring with other members of the school board after his election as treasurer in 1924. He lost a bid for township clerk in 1926, a public rejection that some believe triggered his descent into violent planning.
Compounding his anger was the fact that his wife Nellie was chronically ill, likely with tuberculosis. Medical bills mounted. In June 1926, Kehoe was informed that foreclosure proceedings had begun on his farm. When the sheriff served him the papers, Kehoe muttered, “If it hadn’t been for that $300 school tax, I might have paid off this mortgage.”
But what no one realised at the time was that Kehoe had already begun collecting large quantities of explosives, legally purchased pyrotol and dynamite, under the guise of farm work. From the summer of 1926 onwards, he used his access to the school as an electrician to plant over a ton of explosives in the basement of both school wings.
Nellie was discharged from Lansing's St. Lawrence Hospital on May 16, and was murdered by Kehoe some time between her release and the bombings two days later.
Prior to the day of the disaster, Kehoe had loaded the back seat of his truck with metal debris capable of producing shrapnel during an explosion. He also bought a new set of tires for his truck to avoid breaking down when transporting the explosives. He made many trips to Lansing for more explosives, as well as to the school, the township, and his house. Ida Hall, who lived in a house next to the school, saw activity around the building on different nights during May. Early one morning after midnight she saw a man carrying objects inside. She also saw vehicles around the building several times late at night. Hall mentioned these events to a relative but they were never reported to police.
The Day of the Disaster
At around 8:45 a.m. on the morning of 18 May 1927, a series of explosions shattered the calm of Kehoe’s farmstead. These were not accidental barn fires or stray sparks from faulty equipment. They were carefully timed incendiary devices—homemade firebombs that Kehoe had meticulously prepared and wired throughout his home and outbuildings. Within moments, the Kehoe farmhouse, barn, garage, and tool sheds were engulfed in flames. The thick smoke quickly caught the attention of neighbouring farmers.
As was typical in rural communities of the time, neighbours sprang into action without hesitation. They formed an impromptu brigade, climbing through broken windows, searching the smouldering ruins for any signs of survivors. Among them was O.H. Bush, who later recalled crawling into the burning structure and salvaging furniture and explosives—unaware of the wider catastrophe unfolding.
But Kehoe was already in motion. Calmly, he pulled up in his Ford pickup truck, its bed loaded with shrapnel and dynamite, hidden beneath a layer of tools and farm equipment. He paused just long enough to speak to the men battling the fire. According to witnesses, his words were chilling in hindsight:
“You fellows are my friends. You better get down to the school.”
Without offering further explanation, he climbed into his vehicle and drove away, leaving behind the wreckage of his property and the charred remains of his wife Nellie, whose body was later found in a wheelbarrow by the chicken coop.
North wing explosion
Classes at Bath Consolidated School began at 8:30 a.m. Kehoe had set an alarm clock in the basement of the school's north wing which detonated the dynamite and pyrotol he had hidden there at about 8:45 a.m. Rescuers heading to the scene of the Kehoe farm fire heard the explosion at the school building and turned back in that direction. Parents within the rural community rushed to the school. The school building resembled a war zone, with 38 people killed in the initial explosion, mostly children.
Eyewitnesses and survivors were interviewed afterwards by newspaper reporters. First-grade teacher Bernice Sterling told an Associated Press reporter that the explosion was like an earthquake:
...the air seemed to be full of children and flying desks and books. Children were tossed high in the air, some were catapulted out of the building
Eyewitness Robert Gates said the scene was pure chaos at the school:
Mother after mother came running into the school yard, and demanded information about her child and, on seeing the lifeless form lying on the lawn, sobbed and swooned... In no time more than 100 men at work tearing away the debris of the school, and nearly as many women were frantically pawing over the timber and broken bricks for traces of their children. I saw more than one woman lift clusters of bricks held together by mortar heavier than the average man could have handled without a crowbar.
Ellsworth recounted:
I saw one mother, Mrs. Eugene Hart, sitting on the bank a short distance from the school with a little dead girl on each side of her and holding a little boy, Percy, who died a short time after they got him to the hospital. This was about the time Kehoe blew his car up in the street, severely wounding Perry, the oldest child of Mr. and Mrs. Hart".
The north wing of the school had collapsed, leaving the edge of the roof on the ground. Ellsworth recalled that "there was a pile of children of about five or six under the roof". He volunteered to drive back to his farm and get a rope heavy enough to pull the school roof off the children's bodies. Returning to his farm, he saw Kehoe driving in the opposite direction, heading toward the school. "He grinned and waved his hand," Ellsworth said. "When he grinned, I could see both rows of his teeth"
The Truck Bomb
Arriving at the school in his truck—loaded with shrapnel, dynamite, and gasoline—Kehoe called Superintendent Emory Huyck over to speak. Witnesses later recalled seeing the two men struggle, possibly over a rifle, before Kehoe detonated the explosives inside the vehicle.
The blast killed Kehoe, Huyck, retired farmer Nelson McFarren, postmaster Glenn Smith, and eight-year-old Cleo Clayton, a boy who had survived the initial bombing. Over a dozen more were injured.
The carnage was incomprehensible. Kehoe had planned to annihilate the entire school. Searchers later discovered 500 pounds (230 kg) of unexploded dynamite and pyrotol in the south wing of the building. If the second device had functioned as intended, the death toll would likely have doubled.
Investigations and Inquest
Police and state investigators swiftly concluded that Andrew Kehoe had acted entirely alone in orchestrating the Bath School disaster. The evidence was both overwhelming and meticulously laid out. Inside the wreckage of the school, investigators uncovered clear signs of a calculated and technically sophisticated attack. Alongside the rubble in the basement were hundreds of pounds of pyrotol and dynamite, arranged with military-style precision. In the still-standing south wing, police discovered another 500 pounds (230 kg) of explosives that had failed to detonate. This cache included dynamite hidden in piping and rods, all linked by wires to an alarm clock detonator, which had evidently malfunctioned during the initial blast.
There was more: among the ruins, state police found a container of gasoline rigged with a length of tubing—an apparent attempt to trigger a secondary fireball via fumes and ignition. The entire configuration suggested a mind with electrical training, and as the former school board treasurer and an experienced electrician, Kehoe had both the knowledge and opportunity to install the devices over a period of many months.
Dynamite purchase records from various supply shops and sporting goods stores in Lansing and surrounding areas also pointed squarely at Kehoe. By buying small quantities at different times, he had avoided suspicion, aided in part by the fact that dynamite was commonly used by farmers at the time for clearing stumps or blasting ditches.
The coroner’s inquest into the disaster began almost immediately, with the goal of establishing a full account of the tragedy and determining whether any other individuals or parties bore responsibility. More than 50 witnesses were called to give testimony before a jury of local citizens. Neighbours and acquaintances of Kehoe described a man who was intelligent but cold, highly methodical, and intensely bitter.
Testimony painted a picture of a man with a longstanding grudge against nearly every institution in Bath Township. Witnesses spoke of Kehoe’s obsessive protests over school taxes, his attempts to block even minor expenditures as a school board member, and his bitter enmity toward Superintendent Emory Huyck. Several recalled how Kehoe had once beaten a horse to death when it failed to meet his expectations and that he shot a neighbour’s dog simply for barking. His compulsive neatness and meticulous dress sense, changing shirts midday if they became even slightly soiled, further reinforced his image as a man of rigid control, prone to anger when order slipped beyond his reach.
But despite these unsettling characteristics, there had been no actionable warnings that could have led authorities or the community to foresee a planned mass murder. As the jury reviewed the evidence, they ultimately exonerated the school board and its employees, finding no grounds to accuse anyone of negligence or complicity. In their official verdict, they concluded that Kehoe had “conducted himself sanely and so concealed his operations that there was no cause to suspect any of his actions.”
The Victims and Community Response
In total, 45 people died in the Bath School disaster. Thirty-eight were children between the ages of 7 and 14. The rest included teachers, the school superintendent, passers-by, Kehoe’s wife, and Kehoe himself.
The names of the children, such as Percy Hart, Hazel Weatherby, and Blanche Harte, are etched in the historical record. Their loss was marked by an immense public outpouring. Over 100,000 vehicles passed through the town in the days following. Aid poured in from across the United States. Senator James J. Couzens personally donated $75,000 (over £1.3 million in 2024) to rebuild the school.
Killed in the massacre |
Before the school bombing
|
Killed in the school bombing
|
Killed by the truck bombing
|
Died later of injuries
|
Rebuilding and Remembrance
By September 1927, the Bath community resumed classes in temporary buildings. A new school was constructed with donated funds, and in 1928, it was named the James Couzens Agricultural School.
A statue entitled Girl with a Cat was presented as a memorial. The original school cupola was saved and later incorporated into James Couzens Memorial Park, established after the school building was demolished in 1975. A bronze plaque with the victims’ names was added in 2002.
Today, a historical marker and a small museum ensure the tragedy is not forgotten.
Looking Back
The Bath School disaster is sometimes framed as an early act of domestic terrorism. Psychologists point to Kehoe as an archetype of the “dangerous injustice collector” a person who hoards grievances until they explode in violence.
Though initially covered extensively in the national media, the disaster was overshadowed by Charles Lindbergh’s transatlantic flight, 3 days later.
The final chilling detail: when authorities inventoried Kehoe’s estate, they concluded he had enough unsold equipment to pay off his mortgage. He did not have to destroy everything. He chose to.
Sources:
Bernstein, Arnie. Bath Massacre: America’s First School Bombing
Ellsworth, M.J. The Bath School Disaster
The New York Times archives, May 1927
Michigan State Historical Commission
Journal of Surgical Research
Michigan State Police Reports, 1927
U.S. National Archives
