The never solved bombing of Wall Street in rare pictures, 1920

On September 16, 1920, hundreds of Wall Street workers came out to lunch, a horse-drawn carriage parked in front of the world's most powerful banking institution – JPMorgan Bank.

Inside the wagon, a 100-pound (45 kg) dynamite with a 500-pound (230 kg) heavy, cast iron sash weight exploded in a timer-set explosion, tearing the weight through the air.

The horse and wagon were torn to small pieces, but the driver is believed to have abandoned the vehicle and fled. The powerful explosion turned the country's financial center into a terrifying war zone and killed 38 people and seriously injured hundreds.

The noise was heard throughout lower Manhattan and across the East River in Brooklyn. The smoky streets were covered with broken glass, debris from damaged buildings and bodies.

JPMorgan's chief clerk, William Joyce, who was sitting near the front window, was among those killed, and JPMorgan, Jr.'s son, Junius Morgan, was wounded. The New York Stock Exchange across Broad Street was immediately closed.

Initially, it was not clear whether the blast was a deliberate act of terrorism. The crew cleaned up the damage overnight, including physical evidence that would be crucial to identifying the culprit today.

By the next morning, Wall Street was back in business—broken windows draped in canvas, workers in bandages, but still working.

Conspiracy theories abound, but the New York Police and Fire Department, the Bureau of Investigation, and the U.S. The Secret Service was at work. Each eagerly followed the lead. The bureau interviewed hundreds of people who were around the area before, during and after the attack, but developed little information of value.

Some of the memories of the driver and the wagon were vague and almost worthless. The NYPD was able to reconstruct the bomb and its fuse mechanism, but there was much debate about the nature of the explosive, and all possible components were generally available.

Because no one claimed responsibility for the bombing, the New York Police Department considered several possible motives. The murder of JPMorgan, Jr. was ruled out as a motive because he was in Europe at the time of the attack.

Another possibility was an attempt to rob an adjacent sub-treasury building, where $900 million in gold bars was being transported that day. The bombing was eventually deemed an act of terrorism perpetrated by the "Reds" - anarchist and communist sympathizers - who wanted to shatter the symbols of American capitalism.

A pile of anarchist travelers found in a mailbox a block away from Wall Street supported this theory. Suspicion fell on political fanatics, communists and anarchists of foreign origin – Italians, Russians and Jews in particular.

Notably a Gallenist, the Italian anarchist Mario Buda (1884–1963), an accomplice of Sacco and Vanzetti, and a car owner, who was later arrested for a separate robbery and murder, is alleged by some historians. including Paul Avrich, was the person most likely to have planted the bombs. Avrich and other historians believe that Buda acted to avenge the arrest and indictment of his fellow Galenists, Sacco and Vanzetti.

The Secret Service and the Federal Bureau of Investigation interrogated thousands of people and arrested several fanatics, but no one was charged with the crime, and the investigation was dropped in 1940. No monument was erected to commemorate the event, and the facade of the damaged 23 Wall Street building was not repaired.