Gary Indiana: Conspiracy Theories
I planned to write a Gary-themed conspiracy theory story on my blog last year. Military equipment was going to be a topic. I posted the first portion of this in my group. Yet, I decided to expand upon the post since I’m in a writing mood tonight.
In the 1970s, a conspiracy theory detailed the US government using the military to take over Gary.
The 70s was a fearful decade as far as socioeconomics and politics were concerned. It was uncharted territory, post-Civil Rights era America.
Vietnam ended in 1975. So all war equipment scattered throughout the country needed to get transported for storage, scrapping, and whatnot.
The Region was used extensively as a layover for various military equipment trains. War vehicles passed through and were temporarily stored everywhere for a few years.
In Gary’s case, military equipment trains used to get stored on the “high line.” Gary has numerous high rail lines. Yet the specific track known as “the high line” is the elevated Gary & Western/Indiana Harbor Belt tracks that go through the southern border of downtown Gary.
Kids used to walk the “high line” to get back and forth between school and home. Locals used it to cross from one side of Gary to the other without being seen.
This conspiracy was likely the result of juvenile minds running wild. Undoubtedly, they would have seen these military equipment trains stored on those tracks and wondered what the deal was.
Because the “high line” curled around numerous blocks in Emerson and downtown, the conspiracy theory, primitive as it was, said that Gary would be “surrounded” by the military. Next, troops would round up all the minorities and box them between Gary Works and the “high line.”
Gary would be militarily occupied and under federal martial law. Of course, in theory, federal martial law doesn’t exist, depending on who you ask.
During the Red Summer strikes of 1919, Gary was under military occupation for a while.
My column, ‘Red Summer’ lesson doesn’t echo in 2021, talks a bit about the occupation.
“Gary was famously placed under martial law after Mayor Hodges phoned in the Indiana state militia. They were already in the Region handling similar unrest in East Chicago. In addition, Secretary of War Newton D. Baker had federal reserves on-call with light war equipment ready. The reserves were not needed.”
The Indiana National Guard got called to help keep order during the 1967 election and a pseudo-race riot in 1968.
So, historically, there is precedent for such theories to fester, albeit fledgling.