University of Texas tower shooting

On the night of July 31–August 1, 1966, 25-year-old Marine veteran and University of Texas student Charles Whitman fatally stabbed his mother, Margaret Whitman, at her Guadalupe Street apartment, and his wife, Kathleen Whitman, in the couple's Jewell Street apartment, leaving suicide notes describing his intent to spare them "the embarrassment" he believed his later actions would cause.

The following morning, Whitman purchased additional firearms and ammunition, packed a footlocker with weapons and supplies, and disguised himself in coveralls before driving to the University of Texas at Austin campus. Using false credentials, he gained access to the Main Building (the Tower) shortly before noon on August 1, 1966. On the 28th floor, he bludgeoned and then fatally shot receptionist Edna Townsley, and shot members of a visiting family on the stairwell, killing 16-year-old Mark Gabour and 56-year-old Marguerite Lamport and wounding two others. He then barricaded the stairwell and began firing from the observation deck at approximately 11:48 a.m., targeting people on and around the campus, including an eight-months-pregnant woman whose unborn child was killed.

Over the next roughly 96 minutes, Whitman killed 15 people from the tower and wounded at least 31 others, while police officers and armed civilians returned fire from the ground and a police-chartered aircraft attempted to provide a vantage point for a police sharpshooter. Austin Police officer Billy Paul Speed was among those killed while responding to the scene. Officers Ramiro Martinez and Houston McCoy, aided by civilian Allen Crum and other officers, ascended the tower and reached the observation deck at approximately 1:21 p.m. In the ensuing confrontation, McCoy fatally shot Whitman, with Martinez also firing at him; Whitman was pronounced dead at 1:24 p.m.

An autopsy found a small tumor in the white matter above Whitman's amygdala; experts have disagreed on whether it contributed to his actions. In total, Whitman killed 17 people, including his mother, wife, and an unborn child, counting two additional deaths in later years — 17-year-old Karen Griffith, who died a week after being shot, and David Gunby, who died in 2001 after health complications tied to his 1966 gunshot wound, a death that was officially ruled a homicide.

The university closed for one day before reopening on August 3, 1966. The observation deck was closed to the public until 1968, closed again after several later suicides, and reopened for guided tours in 1999 with added security screening. The shooting spurred the creation of a formal university police force in Texas, formalized through state legislation signed in 1967. Officers Martinez and McCoy were later awarded Medals of Valor by the City of Austin, and in 2008 the Austin City Council recognized additional police officers and civilians for their roles in ending the shooting. Memorials to the victims have since been established on the university campus, including a garden and inscribed stone unveiled on the fiftieth anniversary of the shooting in 2016.