Join us in person or online for a seminar with Dr Kery Lawson.
Forgotten Histories: MOVE and Their Animals in “The City That Bombed Itself”
On Mother’s Day weekend 1985, state and local police bombed the West Philadelphia home of MOVE, a Black-led and Black-majority political, religious, and environmental group formed in the early 1970s. Within a decade of MOVE’s founding, their resistance to The System—all of the normative culture and laws in contemporary life in the United States—inspired acrimony among neighbours and city officials. MOVE exercised their beliefs by demonstrating against zoos and pet stores, removing the wiring from their homes to eschew modern technology, and voicing their complaints against the city via a loudspeaker attached to their house. The conflicts reached their zenith in May 1985, when more than a dozen of MOVE’s human and animal family members perished in the bombing and ensuing fire, which also destroyed the surrounding city block, earning Philadelphia the title of “the city that bombed itself.” MOVE is known primarily for their roles in environmentalism and Black liberation, especially since the group attracted former Black Panthers. Historians and journalists most often refer to the cats, dogs, rats, and cockroaches, whom they treated as kin, as a quirk or side note rather than as a pillar of their philosophy. This presentation tracks MOVE’s rhetoric in interviews, speeches, and testimony, placing animals back at the centre of their story. The creatures in their homes and yards were more than mere nuisances. They were woven into the group’s rehearsals in total liberation.
6 May 2026, 11am AEST
Burwood: C2.05.01
Waurn Ponds: IC1.108
Zoom: Click here.
Katheryn Lawson, MLIS, PhD, is a historian and oral historian who studies the intersections of race, animal care and control, and the urban United States. She holds degrees in English, music performance, historical musicology, and library and information science. By day, Katheryn works as an archivist in Delaware, United States, and by night and weekend, she freelances as an editor and music writer.
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