MovieChat Forums > The Deadly Tower (1975) Discussion > It happened 40 years ago today.

It happened 40 years ago today.


The shooting spree by Charles Whitman, from atop a tower on the University of Texas campus in Austin, TX, which this movie is a dramatization of, took place on Monday, August 1, 1966, which was 40 years ago today. My parents were married on Saturday, July 31, 1965 in York, SC, then moved to Charleston, SC, and were living there when this happened, the day after their first anniversary. It was just over a year and a half before I was born (March 5, 1968), and just under three years before they sold that house and we moved to Hickory Grove, SC (in the upstate). I saw this movie for the first time on TV one night in the late 1970s with my father, and he made no mention of this, but I then taped it in the late 1980s and watched it some more after that, and one night in 1993 I tried to get my mother to watch it, but she did not want to, but did in fact remember when it had happened, and hearing about it in Charleston then, and was able to recall some details of it. It was certainly tragic, but does anyone on here that is old enough remember when this did happen (as it has been 40 years now)? If so please respond.

"I happen to be a vegetarian". Lex, from Jurrasic Park

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I remember when it happened. I was 13 and I live near Dallas. I saw newsreel footage of the incident and read newspapers of the day, along with Look, Life, Time, Newsweek, etc.

No one here could believe it happened. It was so tragic and sad.

"Listen, I don't tan, I don't burn, I implode."

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I am too young to have been there, but my dad's sister and her husband at the time where in Austin (he was going to school). She was around the tower, but never in harms way. He on the other hand was down helping people who had been shot. Texas Monthly magazine had a great article on it this month.

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I am sad to say that I am 19 years old and I have never ever heard about this story in life. I am reading stuff on it now but how weird that I never heard about this!!

"Without hope, no one can survive."

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Yes you should watch this film.

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