By Margaret Dore, Esq.
The bomb, dynamite, had been thrown on the roof above my parents' bedroom closet adjacent to our carport. She was home with my four siblings. My father, a state legislator, and I were in the state capitol, staying at different places. I was 12 years old. It was 1970.
A Thump on the Roof
My mother told me that she had heard a thump on the roof above her bedroom closet, which had caused her to put her head in the closet, under the bomb, to try and figure out what had caused the noise.
She then went outside the house and into our carport, once again, physically placing herself under the bomb.
She then went back to the front door, which my brother Rick had locked, apparently trying to be funny. He finally let her in, which slowed her down on her way back to the bedroom to look in the closet again.
My memory per her telling is that she was back in the bedroom and close to the closet when the bomb went off. Most of the force went up. My memory is that she was not hurt. It took me years to figure out that a slight difference in timing could have led to her having been seriously injured or killed. Would my father have remarried? Would I have had half-siblings with a step mother?
Gallery Walk
In August 1992, my mother called me up saying that she wanted to go to Gallery Walk in Pioneer Square, an activity that we would not normally do. She told me that the authorities had been in contact with Bissell, who had been working in Oregon as a physical therapist.
By this time, Bissell had got his affairs cleaned up and was a featured artist (painting, I believe) at a Gallery Walk event near Seattle's Pioneer Square. She asked me to go with her.
Per my recollection, there were two rooms, one where Bissell was the featured artist, which was a private viewing area with his art. The other room was more of a gallery.
In any case, I got kind of embarrassed that my mother was going to ask the artist if he had bombed our house. So I told her to go on in and I would wait for her. While waiting, pretending to look at art, I spoke with a guy about my age, who told me that he had just come back from Hurricane Andrew.
I decided that maybe I should go see how my mother was doing.
She was just coming out as I started in. She told me that she had introduced herself. "Hi. My name is Mary Dore. Remember me?"
She said that he did not respond to her comment. They maybe talked a bit, then she cut to the chase. "Did you bomb my house?"
Per my mother, he answered back, "I was in jail that night."
They also got into the ethics of bombing, with his position being "the good of the many versus the good of the few."
Once again, she cut to the chase, "I didn't like being bombed."
We left and went to a nearby restaurant for dinner. And then life went on.