Broken Glass: “I think it’s very foolish for them to act this way with a war going on…”

Dr. Harold E. Edgerton, Hammer breaking glass window pane, 1933

Thomas and David Collins, [Unidentified Woman], ca. 1857-1909

E. J. Bellocq, Storyville Portrait, New Orleans, ca. 1912 (printed ca. 1967)

Weegee, [Bernice Lythcott and her one-year-old son Leonard looking out a window through which hoodlums threw stones, Harlem], October 18, 1943

Police Called to Give Negroes “Freedom From Fear”
Acts of vandalism directed against a 166th St. apartment house recently opened to Negro tenants died down Saturday night after a week of disorder evidently intended as a warning to Negro families not to move into the block.
Peace was restored when Police Commissioner Valentine assigned a patrolman to cover the house, at 453 W. 166th St., [perhaps it’s not a coincidence, Google Street view is not available on this block] between Edgecombe and Amsterdam Aves., and another to the nearby corner.
However , it was noted that the police protection was present only during the day, and no patrolman were seen near the building Saturday night. It has been at night that most of the intimidation has occurred…
The only other Negro-tenanted house in the block, at No. 461, is partially boarded up as a result of vandalism. A legend scrawled in orange paint on this building reads: “The Nigers (sic) Stink.”
All the apartment houses on 165th St. between Edgecombe and Amsterdam Aves. are occupied by Negroes, while 167th St., between the same avenues, is exclusively occupied by whites. Negro families believe the white residents resent their occupancy of 166th St., the “boundary.”
A sergeant at the local police station said the patrolman on the beat had been ordered to give special attention to the house. No arrests have thus far been made.
“I think its very foolish for them to act this way with a war going on,” said Lythcott of the persecutions. “They should realize the colored boys are fighting for them the same as the white boys are.”

PM Daily, October 18, 1943, p. 12

Pirkle Jones, Plate glass window of the Black Panthers Party National Headquarters the morning it was shattered by the bullets of two Oakland policemen, September 10, 1968

Brett Weston, Cracked Windshield, 1978