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1969 Pennsylvania Turnpike shootings
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Spree shooting in Pennsylvania, U.S.
May 2025
October 2019
1969 Pennsylvania Turnpike shootings Pennsylvania Turnpike
40.228830 -76.333073 8 right 300 206 file Map of USA without state names.svg 120 64 96 22 120 Approximate start of shooting Red pog.svg 8 left 10 40.129845 -75.791428 Approximate start of shooting Approximate end of shooting Red pog.svg 8 right 10 40.214798 -76.784527 Approximate end of shooting Pennsylvania Turnpike (East of Harrisburg), U.S. 40.1298 -75.7914 type:event_region:US-PA inline,title 1969 4 5 10:17a.m. – 11:30a.m. EST Spree shooting mass shooting mass murder murder-suicide M1 carbine Marlin 336 .30-caliber carbine 5 (including the perpetrator) 16 Donald Martin Lambright
On April 5, 1969, Donald Martin Lambright, son of comedian Stepin Fetchit, was traveling along the Pennsylvania Turnpike, east of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, when he went on a shooting spree. Reportedly, he injured sixteen and killed four, including his wife, with an M1 carbine and a .30-caliber Marlin 336 carbine, before turning one of the rifles on himself.1969-04-07 Pike Killer Felt Violence Only Racial Answer: Black Militant Kills 3, Including His Wife, Then Commits Suicide en-US 42 1 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette AP 214 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=G8daAAAAIBAJ&sjid=z2wDAAAAIBAJ&pg=6070%2C782221 2019-09-07 1068-624X Google News Archive1969-04-06 Angry Young Man en-US 45 The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/1969/04/06/archives/angry-young-man.html subscription1969-04-10 Pike killer not on drugs en-US 42 10 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette AP 217 https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=S0QNAAAAIBAJ&sjid=z2wDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3196,1465564 1068-624X Google News Archive
The shooting was officially ruled a murder-suicide, but the account of the circumstances upon which the ruling was based was questioned by Lambright's daughter and discussed at length in her 2005 self-published book about Stepin Fetchit. In a Los Angeles Times interview, Lincoln Perry stated his belief that his son was set up. Lambright's involvement with the Black Power movement at the peak of the COINTELPRO program was believed to be related to his death.https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1985-11-20-mn-7848-story.html Stepin Fetchit, Noted Black Movie Comic of '30s, Dies Seiler Michael 1985-11-20 Los Angeles Times 2017-03-08 en-US 0458-3035
Victims
Traveling in the same car was the Keenan family:
Ignatius Keenan, dead
Ruby Keenan, dead
Paul Keenan, injured
Critically injured:
Vincent Saitta, shot in the head; died at Harrisburg Hospital on May 9, 1969.
George A. Bonsell, injured
Ernest R. Stephens, injured
Kim Stevens, injured
Traveling in the same car were the shooter and his wife:
Donald Martin Lambright, the shooter, committed suicide
Annette Lambright, his wife, dead Son of Stepin Fetchit: Sniper Killer of 3 Termed 'Black Man with No Hope...' https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=DS19690407.2.35&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------1 The Desert Sun Palm Springs, California April 7, 1969 United Press International 4 26432381 California Digital Newspaper Collection en September 7, 2019
Perpetrator
Donald Martin Lambright (born Donald Martin Perry; May 21, 1938 – April 5, 1969) was the biological son of comedian Stepin Fetchit, though they only met two years before Lambright's death. A child of divorce, he took the name of his stepfather, Dr. Middleton Hugher Lambright Jr. (November 7, 1908 - June 14, 1999), a thoracic surgeon in Cleveland. He grew up in New York City and Cleveland. He studied political science at Lincoln University in Oxford, Pennsylvania, after being discharged from the US Air Force in 1961, following four years of service and two tours in Vietnam. Just before the shooting, he quit his job at the Ohio state employment office in Cleveland.
See also
1967 Clinton County, Pennsylvania spree shootings, a spree shooting in Pennsylvania which occurred two years earlier
Midland–Odessa shootings, a shooting that also occurred along a highway
References
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Category:1969 mass shootings in the United States
Category:1969 murders in the United States
Category:1969 in Pennsylvania
Category:Spree shootings in the United States
Category:Murder–suicides in Pennsylvania
Category:Mass murders in Pennsylvania
Category:Deaths by firearm in Pennsylvania
Category:April 1969 in the United States
Category:1960s mass murders in the United States
Category:Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission
Category:Mass shootings in Pennsylvania
Category:1969 mass murders
Category:1969 road incidents
Category:Road incidents in the United States
Category:African-American history of Pennsylvania
Category:Uxoricides in the United States
Category:Violence against African-American women in Pennsylvania