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A short walk away from my present home stands a house that has a very colorful history and ties to the United Mine Workers union. My small section of the town was a mine owned property of rental units that included a company store and various other support businesses. The houses were made from inexpensive terracotta tiles and were not very large to house miners and their families near the coal mines that were local to our town.
National history was written one fateful new years eve in 1969 as a triple murder was committed for the UMW President W A Tony Boyle to silence the strategy that Joseph "Jock" Yablonski had been planning to offer more rights to the miners and proper representation by their union,
Jock was Boyles opponent for UMW presidency bid and was eliminated by Boyle along with his wife and daughter to leave no witnesses.
Three small-time burglars from Cleveland celebrated New Years Eve in 1969 by sitting in a car on a lonely road near Clarksville in rural Washington County. They drank beer and whiskey and waited for the lights to go out in an old brick farmhouse they were watching not far away. Perhaps the men were building up their courage. This was no routine theft job. This was the big time , murder for hire.
At 1 a.m., the farmhouse went dark. The three men , Paul Gilly, Aubran Martin and Claude Vealey approached the house, flattened the tires on two cars in the driveway, cut telephone wires, then entered the residence through a back door. After taking off their shoes, the three crept upstairs.
They carried two weapons , an M1 carbine and a revolver. Martin wielded the revolver. He snuck into the bedroom of Charlotte Yablonski, 25, and shot her two times in the head. Vealey and Gilly entered the bedroom of Charlotte’s parents, Jock and Margaret Yablonski. Vealey attempted to fire the carbine but the clip fell out. Gilly picked up the clip, inserted it into the weapon and managed to fire one shot at Joseph Yablonski. Then the gun jammed.
By then Martin had entered the room. Joseph Yablonski was making a move for a nearby shotgun. Martin fired four shots with the revolver, killing both Joseph and Margaret.
So went the final political assassination of the bloody 1960s.
A short walk away from my present home stands a house that has a very colorful history and ties to the United Mine Workers union. My small section of the town was a mine owned property of rental units that included a company store and various other support businesses. The houses were made from inexpensive terracotta tiles and were not very large to house miners and their families near the coal mines that were local to our town.
National history was written one fateful new years eve in 1969 as a triple murder was committed for the UMW President W A Tony Boyle to silence the strategy that Joseph "Jock" Yablonski had been planning to offer more rights to the miners and proper representation by their union,
Jock was Boyles opponent for UMW presidency bid and was eliminated by Boyle along with his wife and daughter to leave no witnesses.
Three small-time burglars from Cleveland celebrated New Years Eve in 1969 by sitting in a car on a lonely road near Clarksville in rural Washington County. They drank beer and whiskey and waited for the lights to go out in an old brick farmhouse they were watching not far away. Perhaps the men were building up their courage. This was no routine theft job. This was the big time , murder for hire.
At 1 a.m., the farmhouse went dark. The three men , Paul Gilly, Aubran Martin and Claude Vealey approached the house, flattened the tires on two cars in the driveway, cut telephone wires, then entered the residence through a back door. After taking off their shoes, the three crept upstairs.
They carried two weapons , an M1 carbine and a revolver. Martin wielded the revolver. He snuck into the bedroom of Charlotte Yablonski, 25, and shot her two times in the head. Vealey and Gilly entered the bedroom of Charlotte’s parents, Jock and Margaret Yablonski. Vealey attempted to fire the carbine but the clip fell out. Gilly picked up the clip, inserted it into the weapon and managed to fire one shot at Joseph Yablonski. Then the gun jammed.
By then Martin had entered the room. Joseph Yablonski was making a move for a nearby shotgun. Martin fired four shots with the revolver, killing both Joseph and Margaret.
So went the final political assassination of the bloody 1960s.
