September 13, 1971, 50 years ago: The Attica Prison Riot is put down after 4 days. It was one of those early 1970s events that served as the "hangover on the morning after" for the 1960s.
Central New York has a lot of European city names on their cities. Syracuse was named after Siracusa in Sicily, and next-door is a town named Liverpool. They have a Paris, an Amsterdam, a Rome, a Lisbon, and a Manchester. A Milan is in the Lower Hudson Valley, a Berlin is outside Albany, a Hamburg is outside Buffalo, and a Madrid is considerably further North, on the St. Lawrence River.
Named for the region of Greece that includes the capital of Athens, Attica is another. It is in Wyoming County, 37 miles east of Buffalo. The Attica Correctional Facility opened in 1931, and has counted among its inmates bank robber Willie Sutton, Black Panther leader H. Rap Brown, David "Son of Sam" Berkowitz (still alive, but at a different prison), John Lennon's killer Mark Chapman (ditto), 1990s serial killer Joel Rifkin (ditto), and Long Island Rail Road shooter Colin Ferguson (ditto).
On September 9, inspired by the various civil rights movements that had been happening over the last 10 years, 1,281 of the 2,200 inmates rioted, and took control of the prison, taking 42 staff hostage. Over the next 4 days, authorities agreed to 28 demands. What they would not agree to was complete amnesty for the rioters, or for the removal of the prison's superintendent.
Nelson Rockefeller, beginning his 4th term as Governor of New York, and generally considered to be the national leader of the Republican Party's liberal wing (there was such a thing at the time), decided he had to be as tough a Governor as the rising star of the Party's conservative wing, Ronald Reagan of California. He sent the State Police in. The death toll was 43: 33 inmates, and 10 correctional officers and civilian employees.
In the aftermath, some changes were made to the New York State Prison system, to make life more tolerable, especially for nonviolent offenders. There has not been a major incident in a prison in the State since.
But the excess of killing helped to damage Rockefeller's reputation. He resigned in 1973, a year before his 4th term ended, and a few months after his draconian new drug laws infuriated people further. He served as Vice President in the last 2 years of Gerald Ford's Presidency, but was not nominated for a full term in 1976, and died under scandalous circumstances in 1979.
Three movies have been made about the riot: Attica in 1980, Against the Wall in 1994, and The Killing Yard in 2001. In the 1975 film Dog Day Afternoon, a dramatization of 1972 a bank robbery gone wrong in Brooklyn, Al Pacino's character, holding hostages, sees the large police presence outside, and starts chanting, "Attica! Attica! Attica!" and the crowd gathered outside joins in. That scene has been parodied many times.
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September 13, 1971 was a Monday. It was the off-season for the NBA, the ABA and the NHL. The NFL season started the next week, so there was no Monday Night Football game on the night. But there were Major League Baseball games scheduled:
* The New York Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox, 4-0 at Fenway Park in Boston. Stan Bahnsen pitched a 3-hit shutout, and was backed by 3 hits and 2 RBIs by Roy White.
* The New York Mets beat the Montreal Expos, 4-2 at Shea Stadium, in a game shortened to 5 innings due to rain. Mike Jorgensen hit a home run.
* A doubleheader was split at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. The Baltimore Orioles won the opener 9-1, and the Detroit Tigers won the nightcap 10-5.
* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Atlanta Braves, 2-1 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. The game was tied in the bottom of the 13th inning. With Johnny Bench up, manager Sparky Anderson called for a double steal. Pete Rose was safe at 3rd base, and Braves 3rd baseman Darrell Evans couldn't handle the throw from catcher Earl Williams, allowing Rose to score. Hank Aaron appeared as a pinch-hitter, but did not reach base.
* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Chicago Cubs, 5-1 at Wrigley Field in Chicago.
* The Chicago White Sox beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 6-3 at Milwaukee County Stadium.
* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-5 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis. Willie Montanez won it with a home run in the top of the 10th.
* The Oakland Athletics beat the Kansas City Royals, 2-1 at Kansas City Municipal Stadium. Rick Monday drove in the winning run with a single in the top of the 11th.
* The Houston Astros beat the San Diego Padres, 3-2 at the Astrodome in Houston.
* A doubleheader was split at Anaheim Stadium in the Los Angeles suburbs. The California Angels won the 1st game 3-2, and the Minnesota Twins won the 2nd game 1-0. Jim Kaat allowed 9 hits, but kept the shutout.
* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat their arch-rivals, the San Francisco Giants, 5-4 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. The Dodgers got home runs from Dick Allen (in his only season with them), Willie Davis and Willie Crawford. The Giants got one from Jim Ray Hart. Willie Mays was hit by a pitch in the 1st inning, didn't get a hit, and had to leave the game after 5 innings.
* And the Cleveland Indians and the Washington Senators got rained out at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. The game was rescheduled as part of a doubleheader the next day. The Indians won the opener 6-1.
The nightcap made everybody regret the doubleheader idea, especially the Indians. They led 5-2 going into the 9th inning, but the Senators tied it. It went 16 innings before being suspended by the 1:00 AM curfew the American League had at the time. It was completed on September 20, moved to Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in Washington, but with the Indians still the official home team and batting 2nd.
Sam McDowell was brought into pitch for the top of the 17th, but he lost his control in the top of the 20th inning, and his defense didn't help, as an error helped a 3-run Washington inning. The Indians took a run back in the bottom of the 20th, and had the tying runs on base and the winning run at the plate, but Vada Pinson struck out to end it as an 8-6 Senators win.
The winning pitcher for the Senators was Denny McLain, who, like McDowell, had pitched the entirety of the 4-inning resumption on September 20. It was the 127th win of the former Detroit hero-turned-rogue's career. He would win only 4 more before shoulder miseries ended his career.
Ten days later, the Senators played their last home game, the announcement that they were moving to the Dallas area to become the Texas Rangers already made. Only 14,000 people showed up at the 45,000-seat RFK Stadium, and before the Senators could get the last out of a 7-5 win over the Yankees, some of them stormed the field, and the umpires awarded the game to the Yankees by forfeit. So this 20-inning win over the Indians was the last hurrah for Washington baseball until the Expos became the Washington Nationals in 2005.