The recent I-Team special report on Dayton's worst race riot brought back memories for two area men: one a relative of the man whose death sparked the Sept. 1, 1966 riot, another a local guardsman deployed in the aftermath.
Hours after Lester Mitchell’s fatal shooting, Chip Lytle got a call at his home in Kettering. His National Guard unit was called up.
Lytle was in the Ohio Army National Guard 174th Artillery Unit. Its armory was on West Second Street.
“We took bailing wire, put the windshields down and wired the machine guns to the windshield frame,” said Lytle, 73, recalling how they mounted .30-caliber guns to their vehicles. “They had no firing pins in them, but they had a (ammo) belt maybe 3 feet long. It was just for show.”
>>> PHOTO GALLERY: Scenes from the 1966 riot
Lytle’s unit was first dispatched to guard a warehouse on Washington Street where truckloads of liquor were stored. The machine guns were props, but their rifles were loaded and bayonets affixed.
Conrad Goode doesn’t remember when exactly he heard that his cousin — Lester Mitchell — had been killed, but he says the shooting was senseless, as was the rioting that followed.
“Why in the world would you tear up your home? If you’re going to tear up something, go across the bridge and tear something up,” said Goode, 81.
>>> VIDEO: Examining the riot and challenges facing west Dayton today
Lytle said after they were sure the warehouse was safe and other National Guard units arrived from across the state, they moved the local units. Commanders decided to keep the local guardsmen from areas where there may be conflict and instead had them block bridges over the river.
“You could go into west Dayton, but you couldn’t come back out,” Lytle said. “Anybody going in there, we told them that.”
Lytle said he didn't see any violence. The riot subsided within a day or so, but his unit stayed activated for two weeks to provide support if needed as then-President Lyndon Johnson visited the Montgomery County fair shortly after the riot.
>>> RELATED: Who killed Lester Mitchell?
Goode ended up serving as a pall bearer at Mitchell’s funeral. He remembers the police provided an escort in unmarked cars because they didn’t want to stir up further violence with their presence.
He said Mitchell had discharged from the military six months or so before the shooting and drove a truck during the day and at night operated an after-hours bar attached to his apartment. That’s where he was shot sweeping the sidewalk around 3 a.m.
He remembers the street had two theaters, a clothing store, grocery stores, restaurants and bars.
“We walked every place we went,” he said.
Today, Goode lives in the Wright-Dunbar Village, mere blocks from the shooting. He doesn’t walk anywhere, and doesn’t drive around the area at night for fear of drug-related crime.
“We try to get home before dark because of that,” he said.
>>> FULL STORY: 50 Years after riots, segregation, challenges persist
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