3. A Bomb Detonated in Civil Rights Activists’ Harry Tyson Moore and Harriette Simms Moore’s Living Room On Their 25th Wedding Anniversary
Their love story led to a life of public service, but their violent deaths made history as the first targeted assassinations of the American Civil Rights Movement. In 1925, Harry Tyson Moore and Harriette Simms Moore met when Harry was an elementary school teacher, and Harriette worked for an insurance company. Within a year, the couple married, and they had two daughters together. In 1934, the Moores joined the first chapter of the NAACP in Brevard County, Florida. In their work, they pushed for equal pay for African-American teachers.
By 1941, Harry became president of the Florida NAACP, bringing the couple’s activism to the state-wide level. He initially limited his involvement to sending letters to government officials who supported their work. When Harry started investigating crimes against the African-American population, he endured attacks by the police. On Christmas Day, 1951 – the couple’s twenty-fifth wedding anniversary – an unknown assailant threw a bomb into their bedroom as the couple slept. Harry died immediately, and Harriette lingered for nine days before she passed away. Their murders remain unsolved, but investigators suspected Ku Klux Klan involvement.