Several noted public figures, including Cornell West and Chuck D., will be leading a rally and march to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the MOVE tragedy tomorrow.

On May 13, 1985, Philadelphia police under orders from city officials dropped a bomb on a home at 6221 Osage Ave. occupied by several members of the MOVE organization. Eleven people, including five children, died in the resulting fire and dozens of nearby homes were destroyed.

The rally starts at 11 a.m. at 62nd and Osage and organizers are asking participants to “walk, bike, jog or caravan” to 38th and Market where a speak-out will begin at 4 p.m. Activist Angela Davis and writer Alice Walker have prepared video messages that will be played. Speakers include West, Chuck D., hop hop artist Rebel Diaz, activist and attorney Alton Maddox and activists from the Black Lives Matter movement.

If you are unfamiliar with the MOVE or the events surrounding the bombing, here is an excellent documentary released in 2013 that pieces together news footage and interviews. Other background resources include a post on Philadelphia Magazine’s site today. Here is a look back from the Philadelphia Inquirer during the 25th anniversary.

On May 13, 1985, a Philadelphia Police Department helicopter dropped a bomb onto a row home at 6221 Osage Avenue, the headquarters of the group MOVE. Eleven people lost their lives, five of them children, and inexplicably, despite heavy fire department presence, 61 houses on the block burned to the ground.

Writer Andrea Walls grew up just blocks away from the bombing and witnessed its aftermath, and now, a quarter century later, she’s telling the story of that night into morning through her poetry. Walls’ chapbook, “Ultraviolet Catastrophe” examines the events from all sides, even at times transporting the reader into the mind of the helicopter pilot that dropped the bomb. With empathy, bravery and electric twists of phrase that speak to her project as both poet and witness, Walls brings light to this crucial moment in West Philadelphia history.

“Ultraviolet Catastrophe” was the first publication of Thread Makes Blanket press, a local small press operating out of the Cedar Park area, headed up by West Philly resident, writer, and creative writing professor Marissa Johnson-Valenzuela.  Most recently, the press also released “Letter from Tombs Prison, 1917,” a collection of writings surrounding correspondence between Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman that includes writing by Julie Herrada, Marissa Johnson-Valenzuela, Emily Abendroth, Anna Martine Whitehead, Shaun Slifer and Megan Gibes, as well as a reproduction of an original letter.

Now a Camden resident, Andrea Walls remains active in the Philadelphia literary arts scene and with the Leeway Foundation.  For more information about Andrea’s work, or Thread Makes Blanket Press or to buy “Ultraviolet Catastrophe,” click here or pick one up at the Queer Literary Festival on October 14-16.

– Emma