Battle of Flowers Battle

         In 1979 we were enjoying our second year living in the wonderful city of San Antonio. It’s ambiance, celebrations and cultural diversity were amazing to us. Then came the time for Fiesta with all its colorful parades and events. Of particular interest was the Battle of Flowers Parade, commemorating the those lost at the Alamo. Started in 1891, it has become one of the biggest parades in the big state of Texas. It was a school holiday and Karen was a bit miffed at me for not taking the day off to atend. Fortunately, her friend Jolie invited Karen and our eight-year-old daughter to join them at the parade.

         The parade starts on Broadway near Brackenridge Park and makes its way a couple miles southward to the downtown area. A few blocks from my office thousands of people lined Broadway anxiously waiting to watch the parade from their favorite spot. One of them was 64 year-old Ira Attebury who parked his RV at his customary spot at a local tire store at the corner of East Grayson and Broadway.

         I was having a quiet day at the office with half the staff gone for the parade. About 1:30 PM my secretary, Pat Muniz, came into my office with an anxious look on her face.

“Something is going on at the paraade. Can I turn the television on?”

         I accompanied her to a vacant classroom and set up the TV. I waited as it warmed up. The picture that appeared loked familiar. It was a live shot looking down Broadway, just a few blocks from the office. There had been some sort of a shooting. Then the picture zoomed in on a chaotic scene a block further down the street.

         Pat’s face paled.

         “My kids are there!” she shrieked as she watched in horror. Others trickled in to watch. Someone who had been outside said he had heard shots. We watched in stunned silence as the story began to unfold in real time. Gunshots, injuries, chaos. Pat wanted to run down to the parade route, but others disuaded her. I remember being only slightly worried about Karen and Angie. Surely, they were somewhere downtown and miles away from whatever was happening.

         The reports got worse and worse. Multiple victims, several cops down, ambulances everywhere. Parade cancelled. The shooting seemed to have come from an RV parked at a tire store. After 30 minutes it had finally stopped. The police were securing the area. The zoomed camera shot showed chairs, ice chests and umbrellas scattered in disaray. About an hour or so later, Pat got a call from a relative. The kids were scared, but OK. This tough little lady looked totally worn down by the combination of fear, anxiety and relief.

         After work, I found my usual route across Broadway to the Interstate blocked by officers and police tape. I don’t rememnber if Karen called me at work or if I had to wait until I got home to get her report. They had been much closer to the shooting than I had thought. They heard the shots (about 300) and saw people running in panic. Ambulances and police cars rushed to and fro carrying victims and reinforcements. Karen was frightened even as she consoled our crying daughter. Later they saw confused parade participants crying as they sought to find their way from the scene.

         The lone shooter was Ira Attebury. Two women were dead and fifty people were wounded. Six of the wounded were San Antonio Police Officers who were the first to be targeted. Attebury eventually took his own life. An autopsy revealed he was on a PCP amphetamine. The community was in shock. A pall would hang over the rest of the Fiesta celebration.

         A year later, I decided I needed to take my wife and child to the parade. We parked at my office, grabbed our lawn chairs and made our way to Broadway. We proceeded a couple blocks down the route before we found a good spot. After setting the chairs up, I looked across the street. There was the Burggraf Tire Co. where Attebury had parked his RV on that awful day staring back at me. A half dozen of San Antonio’s finest were working the parade route. I would later learn that some of them were the same officers who had been wounded there the year before. When the police vanguard came by to start the parade, the crowd errupted in cheers.

         As I sat back to enjoy the parade I remember thinking that April 27, 1979 was an anomaly, an abberation. It could never happen again.

         I was so wrong.

                                                      LDT July 7, ‘22

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