Looking back: Homemade bomb goes off inside LDS seminary building in 1977

IDAHO FALLS — EastIdahoNews.com is looking back at what life was like during the week of Nov. 17 to Nov. 23 in east Idaho history.

1926-1950

GRACE — The search for a missing plane was underway in the Grace-Preston area, the Idaho Falls Post Register reported on Nov. 21, 1947.

Private pilots from Idaho and Utah were searching for two Butte, Montana, men missing for almost a week after leaving on a flight from Montpelier, Idaho, to Salt Lake City, Utah.

The men were Bruno Koski, a Civil Aeronautics employee, and Harold Leroy Smith, a construction company worker.

The plane was last seen in the Grace-Preston area over the north end of the Wasatch mountain range, where the snow-covered peaks extend upward to 9,000 feet.

On Nov. 20, 20 planes conducted an unsuccessful “dawn to dark” search over a 50-square mile mountainous area for signs of the missing aircraft.

Chet Moulton, Idaho aeronautics director and A.G. Witter, CAA inspector, both of Boise, were directing volunteer pilots from Montpelier, Soda Springs, Grace, Pocatello and Preston, as well as Tremonton and Logan, Utah.

1951-1975

RIGBY — Some “youthful joy riders” who stole a car, ended up returning the car to its rightful owner, the Idaho Falls Post Register reported on Nov. 17, 1952.

“All’s well that ends well. Even after a wild chase,” the paper wrote.

Sheriff Howard Shaffer was on patrol in Rigby Sunday night around 10 p.m. when he saw a car doing “shines” on a sheet of ice in a vacant lot in front of the Rigby Junior High School.

As he drove over to investigate, the driver started to drive away. The sheriff began to chase after the car and even “crowded the car into the borrow pit” but it kept going.

The sheriff looked up the license plate number of the car and found it was registered to Harold F. Goff, of Idaho Falls. Shaffer drove to Idaho Falls to investigate further and stopped at the police station just as Goff came in to report his car had been stolen.

“All stations were alerted — and half an hour later the car was found in front of the Goff home,” the article wrote. “The youthful joy riders had apparently decided to return the vehicle.”

1976-2000

POCATELLO — Pocatello Police recovered the remains of a homemade bomb that exploded inside the men’s bathroom of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints seminary building near Highland High School, the Idaho State Journal reported on Nov. 17, 1977.

The one-story building of classrooms and offices sustained an estimated $200 in damages. The blast, which occurred at 3 p.m., shattered a urinal and blackened walls and mirrors with smoke.

Two witnesses said they remember seeing two youth, believed to be about 18 years old, walking back and forth in front of the building several times and looking through the glass doors minutes before the explosion.

There were no injuries in the blast.

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