BUFFALO, NY - Friday, September 14th will mark the 117th anniversary of the death of President WIlliam McKinley in Buffalo, NY. McKinley was shot 8 days earlier at the Pan American Exposition. An anarchist named Leon Czolgosz approached the President in a receiving line, clutching a gun, which was hidden in a handkerchief.
Czolgosz was able to squeeze off two shots into the President before he was tackled to the floor and beaten by the angry mob. After his arrest, court and law enforcement officials were concerned that he might be killed by mobs of angry people before he could even be put on trial. They installed gates outside of the courtroom, and used a newly-built tunnel beneath Delaware Avenue to transport him from the jail to the courthouse. He was ultimately convicted and executed in less than 3 weeks.
117 years later, that tunnel still exists and is still in use. It has seen some of the most notorious criminals ever in Buffalo and provides a link to one of the darkest chapters in Western New York history.