Terrorism Reference Biographies | Timothy McVeigh Biography

April 23, 1968

Pendleton, New York

June 11, 2001

Terre Haute, Indiana

The Oklahoma City bomber

"It's a very tragic thing."

On the morning of April 19, 1995, a bomb hidden in a rented truck exploded outside the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The explosion killed 168 people, including 19 children who attended a day-care center on the second floor. At the time it was the deadliest single terrorist attack in American history.

The bomb had been left by a young man named Timothy McVeigh. McVeigh planned the bombing with the help of two friends as an act of revenge for a government raid on a religious group's headquarters in Waco, Texas. Six years later, on June 11, 2001, McVeigh was executed for the crime.

Growing up

McVeigh was born in the small town of Pendleton, New York, near the old manufacturing...