Infamous America - BOMBINGS Ep. 3 | “Mad Bomber, Part 1: Vendetta”

Episode Date: January 29, 2025

In 1931, George Metesky suffers a injury while working for Consolidated Edison power company in New York. George feels he is not properly compensated for years of trauma and recovery, and he wants vengeance against Con Ed. He begins a bombing campaign to push for justice against his enemies, and his devices mystify the NYPD. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join   Apple users join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes, bingeable seasons and bonus episodes. Click the Black Barrel+ banner on Apple to get started with a 3-day free trial.   On YouTube, subscribe to INFAMOUS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: hit “Join” on the Legends YouTube homepage.   For more details, please visit www.blackbarrelmedia.com. Our social media pages are: @blackbarrelmedia on Facebook and Instagram, and @bbarrelmedia on Twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My relentless sleep problems have always come from an overactive mind. I lay in bed at night with my mind racing from one thing to another, and then, of course, I have a brainstorm about something new. That lights the fire, and then I'm in real trouble. To calm my mind, the only things that have ever worked with any consistency are sleep gummies. Sleepy Time Advanced Gummies from Mood.com come in various combinations of THC, CBD, and CBN, so you can get something that's very low in THC, but higher in CBD, which helps turn off the stress,

and CBN, which is the thing that makes you sleepy. The brain shuts up, the racing thoughts stop, and it's off to sleep. Mood is federally compliant. The gummies are legal and delivered right to your door. At Mood.com, get 20% off your first order with our promo code, Infamous. Go to Mood.com and use the code infamous to get 20% off your first order. your first order. And they have a 100-day satisfaction guarantee. Mood.com promo code infamous. One of the most iconic buildings in New York City is Grand Central Station. The massive commuter

terminal is located on 42nd Street and Park Avenue, and it's just a few blocks from Bryant Park. It was designed in the French-inspired bow-arts style, and constructed mostly out of granite and marble. The towering facade creates an oil. that complements the equally iconic New York Public Library down the street. The station's grandiosity became so renowned that one person called it, quote, the greatest railway terminal in the world. The station opened in 1913 and quickly became the center of travel for New Yorkers. Commuters would hop on a subway and travel up and down Manhattan or over to Brooklyn.

Or they could take the Long Island Railroad over to Long Island. But the station was more than just a place to catch a ride. There were restaurants, movie theaters, museums, and art galleries within its walls. In the three decades after it opened, Grand Central Station was one of the busiest places in New York. But in the wake of World War II, Americans increasingly moved away from the Big Apple. The economy was on the rise, and people could afford to buy suburban homes. Meanwhile, more and more New Yorkers bought cars, which meant fewer people were taking public transportation.

By the end of the 1940s, Grand Central Station showed signs of decline in both number of travelers and upkeep. By the early 1950s, there were rumors that it might be time to demolish the formerly all-important rail station. Despite the threat of destruction, people still used Grand Central Station while commuting to and from work. And on the afternoon of March 29, 1951, commuters dashed through the station's granite halls in the hopes of squeezing onto trains before the doors closed. The afternoon started like any other afternoon. But just before 5.30 p.m., an explosion rocked the terminal. The blast came from a

cigarette sand urn located just outside the oyster bar, a seafood restaurant that had been around since 1913. The urn was a common feature in the days when people smoked everywhere. Smokers dropped their cigarettes into an opening at the top of a metal tube. The cigarettes tumbled down the cylinder and landed in a pile of sand at the base and snuffed themselves out. At 5.30 p.m., the urn exploded, and sand and shards of metal flew everywhere. No one was hurt. Whether by luck or design, the explosion happened when no one was near the urn. The police and the bomb squad rushed to the scene and discovered the remains of a homemade pipe bomb. But it wasn't an ordinary pipe bomb, and it appeared as if this one had some kind of timed detonator in it. It could have been in the urn for hours or

even days before it detonated. Detectives had no leads. What the NYPD didn't know then, but would learn later, was that the man who left the bomb at Grand Central Station in March 1951 had done it before. A decade earlier, the mysterious bomber had left a couple of fake bombs in the city. But during World War II, he stopped. Now he was back, and he was about to start a six-year campaign that would cause everyone in Manhattan to live in terror. From Black Barrel Media, this is Infamous America. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer, and this season we're telling the story,

stories of the LA Times bombing of 1910, the Mad Bomber of the 1950s, and the crazy case of the Harvey's Casino bombing in Nevada in 1980. This is episode three, The Mad Bomber Part 1, Vendetta. While NYPD detectives scratched their heads over who left the pipe bomb in Grand Central Station, the bomber was long gone. George Metesky was already on his way back home to Waterbury, Connecticut, by the time his device exploded. Once he got home, he went to work crafting another explosive. No one in Waterbury would have expected that George was about to become an infamous terrorist.

George was a Waterbury native. He was born and raised in the small but diverse community to Lithuanian parents. His father was an industrious man who taught George the value of hard work. George quickly became comfortable getting his hands dirty in order to get a job done. As a young boy, George earned a reputation as being slightly eccentric. He was always neatly dressed without a hair out of place, and he was a bit shy. One former classmate described George as a person who didn't talk unless someone else started the conversation. The same classmate also said that George was the type of person who couldn't hurt a fly. But as George grew older, his aptitude for nonviolence changed.

George always considered himself a bit more intellectually superior than his peers, especially when it came to technical subjects. He dropped out of high school because he was bored. He bounced around various odd jobs, mostly in pursuit of mechanical work. Eventually, he enlisted in the Marine Corps and became an electrical specialist. During his time with the Marines, George saw the world. He spent some time in Guam, Mexico, and China. In 1929, 26-year-old George was honorably discharged and landed a job with the Consolidated Edison Company of New York, or Con Ed, as it was commonly called.

Specifically, he worked at their Hellgate plant. Hellgate power plant was a massive structure along the East River that supplied electrical power to the Bronx, Queens, Manhattan, and Westchester County. The plant was the size of two city blocks with four smokestacks that spewed black fumes into the sky. Two impressive turbine generators with the heart of the power plant. The generators operated on coal and water. Men who were covered in thick layers of soot threw chunks of coal into a furnace to keep the fire going. That was Hellgate. Despite George's background, he did not work as an electrician for Consolidated Edison.

Instead, he was a generator wiper. His job was to clean the dust and grease off the generators. It was menial work, but George didn't seem to mind it. By now, the Great Depression was spreading across America, and George considered himself lucky to have a job. George earned a reputation for being a diligent worker who never complained. And then, tragedy struck. September 5th, 1931, started like a typical Saturday.

George woke up, hopped on the subway, and rode it to Cypress Avenue near Hellgate. After clocking in, George trekked to the boiler room, which contained 21 smoke-filled boilers. Once inside, he got to work cleaning out the grease and dust. Unbeknownst to George, one of the boilers had a problem. Pressure began to increase due to a buildup of coal and soot. As George walked by the malfunctioning boiler, it burned. The explosion wasn't huge like a bomb, but it did engulf George in a cloud of toxic fumes. George fell to the ground, grabbed his throat, and started coughing uncontrollably.

He tried his best not to breathe the toxic air, but it was impossible. He felt his throat burn and tasted blood with each heave. Two co-workers, Casey and Kavanaugh, saw George on the ground and rushed over. As they helped George to his feet, they saw George cough up blood. Eventually, George regained himself and the three headed to the foreman, a man named Purdy. Purdy took one look at George and thought George was fine. Coughing up blood wasn't unusual while working at the power plant. In Purdy's estimation, George's condition was typical.

So, Purdy reassigned George to loading wood into trucks. But about 20 minutes later, George suffered another coughing fit and fell to the ground. He managed to pick himself up, but he couldn't shake the coughing. That evening, George's cough worsened, and he spent the night vomiting up blood. George soon realized that his days at Consolidated Edison were numbered. George didn't return to work after the boiler explosion. Instead, he spent the next several days in his tiny Manhattan apartment, and he could barely find the strength to get out of bed.

All day and night, George coughed up blood. About a week after the accident, George was able to call a doctor to examine him at home. Unfortunately, the doctor didn't have the proper equipment with him when he made the house call, and he couldn't diagnose George's condition. The doctor suggested that George returned to his family in Waterbury. George followed the advice.

Back home, he was admitted to a local hospital. hospital. Doctors concluded he suffered from pulmonary hemorrhages. For the next 11 months, doctors gave George various antibiotic treatments, but nothing worked. Finally, a doctor thought that maybe a sanatorium in Tucson, Arizona would be able to help. With no other option, George headed to the desert southwest. In Tucson, George was diagnosed with active pulmonary tuberculosis. For three years, George remained. in Tucson. He lived in a small bungalow and received a series of medical treatments such as pneumothorax therapy. The treatment involved injecting nitrogen gas into an area around the lungs.

The process was extremely painful, but it worked. Over time, George's health improved. Unfortunately, his battle with his former employer was just getting started. Following George's accident, Consolidated Edison agreed to pay George 80% of his weekly salary for six months. George received around $38 a week plus $58 a month related to an insurance settlement. But George was in Tucson for three years receiving treatment, so the money dried up fast. He started writing angry letters to Consolidated Edison and demanding they cover his medical expenses. Consolidated Edison refused. By the end of 1933, the company felt it had fulfilled its financial duty to George,

and it denied all of his requests for assistance. However, the company suggested that George could file a claim with the Workman's Compensation Board. On January 4, 1934, George filed his claim, and it was rejected. The stated reason for the rejection was that George failed to file within one year of the workplace incident. By that time, it had been two and a half years since the boiler explosion. George was livid, and he was convinced that Consolidated Edison was behind the rejection. George believed they had placated his financial worries long enough for the one-year time frame to expire. By 1935, George was unable to continue his stay in Tucson.

He packed up his things and returned to Waterbury. He moved back into his childhood home with his two unmarried. married sisters. One's home, George became increasingly reclusive. He had no friends and showed little interest in dating. Instead, his entire focus was on getting justice from con-ed. George began another extensive letter-writing campaign, and his persistence worked. In early 1936, the workman's compensation board agreed to reconsider George's claim with an actual investigation. In April 1936, George testified about the incident that had occurred five years earlier. But George wasn't the only one called before the board.

Three of George's former co-workers, including his foreman and one of the two men who helped him right after the accident, described the events of that day. All three men contradicted George's version of the accident. They also contradicted each other. One man testified that George simply had a bloody nose, while another said George wasn't at work on the day of the explosion. After consideration, the workman's compensation board officially and definitively denied George's claim. Once again, they cited the one-year time limit as their reason.

They also denied George the opportunity to file any more appeals. But George refused to accept their decision. Once more, he turned to his typewriter and wrote a barrage of letters to anyone and everyone. In the immediate aftermath of the hearing, George wrote more than 800,000 words of fury and vitriol. In the long diatribs, he claimed that Con Ed had turned everyone against him. No one responded to the letters, and they didn't lead to anything. With each passing day, George's mind and imagination wandered into deeper and darker territory. If the letters weren't going to give him the justice he wanted, then he would have to take matters into his own.

own hands. The only question for George was how. George finally found inspiration while taking the subway one day. When the train rolled into a station, the doors opened and three men entered and sat across from him. George looked up and saw that they were his three co-workers, Casey, Cavanaugh and Purdy, the foreman, or at least he believed he did. At that point in George's life, it's not clear if he actually saw them, or if he was beginning to suffer mental breakdowns, and he imagined the entire episode. In reality, or in George's mind, the three men ignored him while they talked and laughed. George was convinced they were talking about him. They were mocking him right to his face. George filled with rage. As George watched them, he envisioned each of their right arms

exploding. During the workman's compensation hearing, each man had raised his right hand and sworn to tell the truth, and they had all lied. It would be a fitting act of old school retribution if they lost their offending appendages. But vengeance against the three men wasn't enough. George believed consolidated Edison turned the entire city against him. They all had to pay. It became clear to George what he needed to do. As he said later, quote, people pay more attention to the noise of a bomb than to a written word. For nearly a decade, George Metesky had tried to gain financial justice from his

former employer, Consolidated Edison. But neither his letter-writing campaign nor appeals to the workman's compensation board yielded the results that George wanted. He decided the only solution was violence. No one knows exactly when George does. decided to build his first pipe bomb or how long it took to construct. But George was a military-trained electrician, and during his appeals process in the 1930s,

he often distracted himself by making mechanical devices. For example, in 1938, he received a patent for a piston-driven circuit breaker. In other words, making a homemade bomb would not have been too difficult for George Meteskey. By the fall of 1940, George's war against Consolidated Edison was ready to begin its next phase. In mid-November, he left Waterbury, Connecticut, and headed down to Manhattan. He entered a con-ed office on West 64th Street, near Lincoln Center, and searched for the right place to leave his first bomb.

In the early afternoon of November 18th, a con-ed employee noticed something out of place sitting on a window sill. It was a wooden toolbox. The employee felt compelled to inspect the toolbox, and he looked inside. The employee was confused to discover a metal pipe, four and a half inches long, wrapped in a piece of paper. The employee unraveled the paper and saw that it was a note in distinctive block lettering. The note read, Con Edison Crooks, this is for you. There is no shortage of powder, boys. It was signed FP. The employee instantly put the pipe back in the box and called the police. Before long, the NYPD filled the halls of Consolidated Edison.

Officers cordoned off the hallway while the bomb squad studied the device. Because the bomb didn't explode when the employee held it, detectives assumed the bomb did not contain a position-controlled detonator. In other words, detonation would not be triggered by movement. Still, the bomb squad carefully placed the pipe bomb into a steel cable bag, transported it in a specially designed truck, and drove it to an isolated location. After further inspection, it became obvious that the bomb was not rigged to detonate. It was a dud. But since there was a note with the bomb, it was obvious that the bomber wanted the device to be found.

Based on the note, investigators knew that whoever left the dud was someone who had an issue with consignment. consolidated Edison. But that could be any one of seven million people who lived in the five boroughs of New York, and the company received hundreds of complaints each day. Detectives figured whoever left the bomb was pulling a prank, so they closed the investigation before ever really starting it. In Waterbury, George Metesky searched the newspapers and hoped to find a headline about his gift to his former employer.

To his dismay, not a single newspaper wrote. reported on it. All he read about was the war in Europe and the aftermath of the Battle of Britain. The press was more concerned about possible Nazi spies lurking in the shadows than some jokester leaving a dud at an office. So, George decided a second bomb might get some attention. On September 24, 1941, 10 months after the first device, a pedestrian was walking down 19th street and noticed a red sock in the middle of the road. The pedestrian picked up the sock and discovered a pipe bomb inside. The bomb squad arrived and immediately recognized the same basic design

as the device from the Con Ed office. Again, it was a dud, and there was no note with the second device, but the police believed they were dealing with the same would-be bomber. Consolidated Edison's main office was only four blocks away. The detectives theorized that the bomb, bomber must have seen a police officer nearby and simply dumped the device before delivering it. Much like the first bomb, the NYPD didn't investigate. They couldn't find any hard evidence to point them in a legitimate direction,

so they just assumed it was another prank. As such, the newspapers showed no interest in reporting on it. George grew frustrated and annoyed with the lack of notoriety. In the weeks that followed, he went back to writing long-winded letters. He sent several letters to Con Ed, and he also started sending them to newspapers, hotels, and department stores. He accused Con Ed of, quote, ghoulish acts and dastardly deeds, and he called them mobsters. He signed each letter, FP.

But shortly after George reignited his crusade, he suspended it. Nine weeks after George placed his second bomb, America suffered an infamous and devastating attack. On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the American naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. The day after Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered his now-famous Day of Infamy speech. George Metesky was among the tens of millions who tuned in to the president's address. George, a former Marine, was angry at a big business and lots of people, but he still loved his country. That same day, he wrote a letter to the NYP It said, quote, I will make no more bomb units for the duration of the war. My patriotic feelings

have made me decide this. Later, I will bring the Con Edison to justice. They will pay for their dastardly deeds. F.P. George stayed true to his word. While the United States went to war against Japan, Germany, and Italy, George suspended his war against Consolidated Edison. But at no No point did he lose sight of his mission. The years of dormancy only intensified his hatred for the energy company. Like so many American men in 1941 and 1942, George received a draft notice, but his medical history immediately disqualified him. Sometime later he tried to enlist, but he was rejected after he failed an exam.

George desperately wanted to fulfill a sense of patriotic duty, but he couldn't do it in the military. He ended up working at a local tool company, but that didn't last long. In 1943, his chronic lung disease flared up, and he spent some time at a nearby sanatorium. By 1945, he was back to living off of unemployment benefits at the Waterbury House with his sisters. Once again, George retreated into solitude. He rarely interacted with anyone who wasn't his family. Soon, the dark thoughts about his old enemy, Consolidated Edison, returned. By the start of the 1950s, George's disillusionment reached a tipping point.

He watched as millions of Americans prospered in the new post-war America. Meanwhile, he was stuck in Waterbury with his sisters, the same place he had been for the better part of 15 years. For many, but certainly not all, life had changed for the better. For George, it remained the same. With the war done, George decided he had waited long enough to resume his bombing campaign. This time, he wanted to make sure everyone in New York heard him loud and clear. On the afternoon of March 29, 1951, George traveled to Grand Central Station in Manhattan.

He walked over to a cigarette sand urn outside the famed oyster bar, dropped a bomb into it, and walked away. A few hours later, the bomb exploded, the first time one of George's devices actually detonated. Miraculously, given the high volume of traffic, no one was injured. Police rushed to the scene and began their investigation, but they ran into a major roadblock. Because the bomb had detonated, recreating the design would be difficult. They were able to retrieve some fragments to get an idea of the bomb's construction, but certain mechanics left investigators confused. They later learned that George had developed a simple but ingenious design.

The bomb wasn't encased in a pipe and it didn't use powder to detonate. Rather, George crafted a timing mechanism based around a cough drop dissolving in water. As the cough drop dissolved, the water level rose. When the water came into contact with wires, the wires sparked and ignited a firing pin which triggered a 25 caliber cartridge. The cartridge fired and the bomb exploded. That day in March 1951, investigators knew very few of those details, and they were unable to obtain any fingerprints. There was no note anywhere around the device, so the NYPD had no reason to connect the bomb to the two unexploded devices placed by the mysterious FP a decade earlier.

The NYPD closed the investigation and chalked the whole thing up to some boys playing pranks. Besides the explosion itself, there was one other major difference between the earlier duds and now. The explosion made the news. At his home in Waterbury, George was thrilled to open various newspapers, including the New York Times, and a read about his device sending shockwaves through the city. George considered the Grand Central Station explosion a test in design and media attention. The test had been a resounding success. He decided to up the ante and make even more noise.

Less than a month after the Grand Central Station bombing, George placed a pipe bomb inside a telephone booth in the basement of the New York Public Library. The bomb detonated in the early evening of April 24, 1951. Based on surviving evidence, the police knew it was connected to the previous bombing, but again, they credited the whole thing to boys playing pranks. At the end of August, George set off another bomb in Grand Central Station. A few weeks later, he hit Consolidated Edison's headquarters on Irving Place with a five-inch pipe bomb. Both caused some physical damage, but thankfully no one was hurt.

To the public and the press, investigators insisted the bombs were just the work of a merry band of jokesters. But behind closed doors, the NYPD began to worry. The bombings were becoming more frequent, and from what they could tell, more advanced. Back in Waterbury, George sensed their fear, and he decided to toy with them. On October 22, 1951, George sent a letter to the New York Herald Tribune. In typical fashion, George didn't hold back. He wrote, Bombs will continue until the consolidated Edison Company

is brought to justice for their dastardly acts against me. I have exhausted all other means. I intend, with bombs, to cause others to cry out for justice for me. More importantly, the letter contained the location of another bomb, a ventilation shaft at the Paramount Theater in Times Square, Hoping not to incite panic, the NYPD bomb squad quietly and discreetly entered the Paramount Theater. In the men's bathroom, located in the basement, law enforcement found a four-inch pipe bomb right behind a ventilation grill.

They removed the bomb without creating chaos or accidentally detonating it. The Paramount Theater attempted bombing marked a turning point for George Metesky. It was the beginning of an inconsistent pattern of notifying, places in advance that there was a bomb in their business. He didn't always give advance warning, but when he did, he made sure to chastise the location if they didn't blame or rebuke Con Ed for the forthcoming explosion. For the police, it was now clear that the bombs were not the work of young pranksters.

Rather, the bomber they knew only as FP was someone with a grudge against consolidated Edison. Over the next few weeks, investigators vigorously chased every wild lead. Captain Howard Finney, head of the NYPD's crime lab, oversaw the manhunt. Captain Finney was described as a quiet, deep thinker who was more than willing to listen to any outlandish idea. It had been years since New York experienced any kind of serial bombing or arsonist, and Captain Finney was open to all possibilities.

But, of course, he also directed his men to follow concrete leads. As October turned to November in 1951, the two most solid clues were the grudge against Consolidated Edison and the handwritten letters. For several weeks, investigators poured over con-ed's files related to disgruntled former employees, and they looked for similarities to the handwritten notes by the bomber, known as FP. Finally, they found a case that seemed to fit. Fifty-six-year-old Frederick Eberhard had been in a dispute with ConEbbard. since he had been fired from the company.

He sent Con Ed threatening letters and a fake pipe bomb. When the police compared Eberhard's letters to the bomber's letters, the handwriting looked similar. Captain Finney was confident that Eberhard was their man, even though there was no direct evidence linking Eberhard to the recent bombings. In early November, 1951, the police arrested Frederick Eberhard at his home in Connecticut. Authority subsequently committed Eberhard to Bellevue Hospital for a psychological evaluation.

As Eberhard toiled in Bellevue, the bombing stopped, and Captain Finney and his squad believed they had the right man. Then on the evening of November 28th, a bomb exploded in a locker at the subway station in Union Square. Shortly after that, the New York Herald Tribune received a letter. The letter said, have you noticed the bombs in your city? If you are worried, I am sorry, and also if anyone is injured. But it cannot be helped, for justice will be served. I am not well. And for this, I will make the Con Edison sorry. Yes, they will regret their dastardly deeds. I will bring them before the bar of justice. Public opinion will condemn them. For beware, I will place more units under theater seats in the near future.

FP. Captain Finney realized Eberhard was not their man. The real bomber was still out there. 90 miles away, George Metesky sat in his garage and built another pipe bomb. The next time he hit a movie theater, as promised, he would spill blood for the first time.

Next time on Infamous America, George Metesky continues to plant bombs in Manhattan. His vendetta continues for a year. The bombs get bigger and the damage gets worse. Meanwhile, the NYPD desperately tries anything and everything to find the man who becomes nicknamed the Mad Bomber. That's next week on Infamous America. Members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week for new episodes.

They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials. And they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website blackbarrelmedia.com. Memberships are just $5 per month. For the full story of the attack on the LA Times, check out the book Deadly Times, the 1910 bombing of the Los Angeles Times

and America's Forgotten Decade of Terror by Lou Irwin. This episode was researched and written by Julia Brickland, original music by Rob Valier. I'm co-writer, host, and producer, Chris Wimmer. Find us at our website, Blackbarrelmedia.com, or on our social media channels. We're Black Barrel Media on Facebook and Instagram and B-Barrel Media on Twitter.

And you can stream all our episodes on YouTube. Just search for Infamous America Podcast. Thanks for listening.