Bombings During First Red Scare

Date: June 2, 1919 • Location: Berlin, Germany

First Red Scare: The anarchist followers of Luigi Galleani (pictured) set off eight bombs in eight cities across the United States.

The first Red Scare was a period during the early 20th-century history of the United States marked by a widespread fear of far-left movements, including Bolshevism and anarchism, due to real and imagined events; real events included the Russian 1917 October Revolution, German Revolution of 1918–1919, and anarchist bombings in the U.S. in 1919. At its height in 1919–1920, concerns over the effects of radical political agitation in American society and the alleged spread of socialism, communism, and anarchism in the American labor movement fueled a general sense of concern.