Ted sent many package bombs that killed 3 and injured 23 from 1978-1995 and was finally arrested near Lincoln Montana April 3 1996. https://en.wikipedia.org/..._Kaczynski

Ted Kaczynski was a genius (youngest professor hired at Berkley), moved to a remote cabin a few years later near Lincoln Montana and began sending package bombs, protesting modern technology. He was named the Unabomber (University and Airline Bomber), making primitive package bombs using a high tensile rubber band that unleashed a nail into some match heads that ignited an explosive powder when the package was opened.

This case was one of the most expensive ever for the FBI. Ted demanded the New York Times and others publish his "Manifesto" and he would cease his bombings. The Manifesto was published and Ted's brother suspected the handwriting style might be Ted's and he alerted the FBI.

I remember April 3, 1996 as a day that one of the President's cabinet members was killed in a plane crash around the Mediterranean and it was not the lead story, but buried behind the story on the capture of Ted Kaczynski.

Must be coming up on an anniversary for the “Freemen” stand off as well. I believe that started around the time Kaczynski was arrested.

June 16, 1996 was when they surrendered.

The Freeman were standing off and making the folks at the Jordan Bar happy when it was announced that Kaczynski was found. We were so proud of Montana. Sigh. At least this time, the whack jobs are in Oregon and THEY have to deal with them.

Although the folks in Jordan made lots of friends and had a great time with the reporters sent to cover the stupidity.

Here's an an interesting side story.

In 1996, my wife Karen worked in the Diamond Block of Helena, an old building on the corner of Sixth Street and Park Avenue. A vacant office in the building was being rented. She heard all sorts of noise going on, as it was an old building with rather poor 1960s interior walls.

Being the neighborly type, Karen went and knocked on their door to introduce herself. A guy opened the door a crack and peered out. After she told him who she was and welcomed them, he muttered thanks and shut the door on her.

A bit perturbed, Karen yelled, "Fine! Just to let you know, I can hear everything you say through these thin walls," and walked back to her office. Fifteen minuted later she had a highly agitated visitor, asking what she had heard. She told him nothing that she could understand. He was highly relieved, and told her that they were a telecommunications company, and the noises she was hearing was the installation of computer hardware.

A week later, Ted Kaczynski was arrested, and the "telecommunications company" turned out to be a temporary FBI office.

I was in Helena doing research at the Historical Society while Kaczynski was being charged. I can’t remember the name of the hotel, it was on the Gulch, Gunnar probably knows it. Anyway the parking lot was full of trucks from CNN, ABC, etc – looked like an antennae farm. One afternoon I had finished my day’s work and was desperately thirsty, so I stopped into a bar at the hotel, the place was full of camera & sound crews, and other off-camera personnel. They had just finished with their evening segments, I was sitting there listening to some interesting gossip and shooting the breeze with a couple CNN guys. All at once pagers and cell phones started going off like crazy. The television guys chugged their beers and headed for the doors. One of the CNN guys asked me if I knew where Jordan, Montana, was. I said sure, it’s close to where I grew up. He said watch the news, something big is going on there. The Freemen had embarked on their 15 minutes of fame and Kaczynski was yesterday’s news.

We were glad when they were arrested. My dad had a bounty on him.

That would be the Park Plaza Hotel, Hal, Still going strong, after multiple changes of ownership.

Another reminiscence, now that Hal brought it up. My brother John and I went to their night club, JD's (now long since replaced by many Holiday Inn bars) to see Foghat in the early 1990s. This wasn't any old Foghat, it was all the original members.

In a bar. In Helena, Montana.

To be sitting at a table in a bar in Helena, Montana, to be watching Lonesome Dave Peverett playing the power chords of "Drivin' Wheel" 20 feet from you, no stage....priceless.

Sorry, it was June 14, 1996.

I saw Nicolette Larson there in the mid 70's. She mentioned that she had been born in Helena. She put on a very good performance that evening and she probably sang her hit song "Lotta Love". I just don't remember. Too many

In September, 1995, the Unabombers "manifesto" was published in the Washington Post. One of the guys on my crew got a copy of it and was reading out loud in the truck one morning, as we drove to the mine. It soon became blatantly obvious the "manifesto" was nothing more than the rantings of an eco-terrorist, of which there was no shortage of, in our neck of the woods those days.

As the guy continued to read, I thought to myself, where is the ideal place for a nut-job like this, to hide in plain sight for years? Where could this guy come and go as he pleased; even spew his s**t, and nobody would bat an eye at him? I told the crew; "This guy's gotta be in Missoula. He'd stick out like a sore thumb anywhere else on the planet".

As it turned out, it wasn't a bad guess.....

Missoula?

Oddy's one of those 'eh, close enough' engineers, apparently.

Oddjob wrote:

...I thought to myself, where is the ideal place for a nut-job like this, to hide in plain sight for years? Where could this guy come and go as he pleased; even spew his s**t, and nobody would bat an eye at him?...

Sandy Valley NV. Art Bell, Bo Gritz, drifters, aliens, desperadoes, who knows? Never experienced an odder place.

There's something in the water I think.

That’s interesting.

Had I chosen to generalize about Kaczynski’s location I would have said Helena. Aside from the Gunnar connection, the difference in travel time between Lincoln and Zoola and Lincoln the Capital City is only around 30 minutes by car.

I realize that back in the day Kaczynski somewhat resembled Larry L., who hung out at the Ox and the 4Bs on East Broadway in Missoula (4Bs is where Larry was shot by the guy who disliked vacuum cleaners), but even so, Helena would just offer much more grist for the mill.

And, as most of us know, grist is gold on MC.com.

Back in the day, Kaczynski resembled most of the people who were in Charley B's and the Top Hat all the time, or in the Ox after midnight,. Ted's rant resembled most of the conversations that were going on when the freaks were not talking about how and where to score on credit. For a number of years, I lived it. Some of my ex-best friends are raging green militants who I have always suspected of ELF activity.

Helena was always a little too redneck or too political to be invisible in. In Mazoo and up the Flathead, Blackfoot or Swan, nobody looks sideways at certain lifestyles.

I have lived in Missoula, Helena and now the Flathead. Oddjob is right.

I can't believe I just posted that.

Great. Now I'm jonesing for a double OxBurger and a run up for breakfast at Sykes.

Book review:
David Kaczynski. EVERY LAST TIE: THE STORY OF THE UNABOMBER AND HIS FAMILY (January 2016).

“The Man Behind the Sunglasses”
--Nathan Smith
PACIFIC STANDARD MAGAZINE
January 28, 2016
http://www.psmag.com/book...sunglasses

Just in time to cash in on the “anniversary”.