Samuel Joseph Byck
Samuel Joseph Byck was a troubled individual born in Philadelphia in 1930, who faced numerous personal and financial challenges throughout his life. The eldest of three brothers in a Jewish family, Byck struggled with feelings of inadequacy, particularly in relation to his father's perceived failures and his brothers' successes. After an honorable discharge from the army, he married shortly after his father's death, but his inability to maintain stable employment led to significant strain on his marriage and family life.
Byck's frustrations escalated after being denied a federal loan to start a business, which, combined with diagnosed mental health issues, fueled his discontent with the political landscape, particularly the Nixon administration. He began to view the political corruption around him as linked to his own failures. His desperation culminated in a plot to assassinate Nixon, leading to his attempted hijacking of Delta Flight 523 in 1974. Tragically, this incident resulted in the deaths of a police officer and a pilot before Byck took his own life.
Byck's actions and the subsequent attention they garnered have had lasting impacts, leading to discussions about civil aviation security and inspiring portrayals in media, such as the film "The Assassination of Richard Nixon" and the Broadway musical "Assassins." His story serves as a complex reflection on mental health, personal failure, and the extremes to which one can be driven by societal and political disillusionment.
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Samuel Joseph Byck
Alleged American hijacker and murderer
- Born: January 30, 1930
- Birthplace: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- Died: February 22, 1974
- Place of death: Baltimore, Maryland
Cause of notoriety: Byck attempted to hijack an airplane with the intention of crashing it into the White House and assassinating President Richard M. Nixon.
Active: November, 1968; February 22, 1974
Locale: Baltimore-Washington International Airport
Early Life
Samuel Joseph Byck (bihk) was born in Philadelphia, the oldest of three brothers in a Jewish family. Byck viewed his father as a failure because of his financial difficulties, but he also saw his father as a kind person. After failing to complete high school and working odd jobs, he entered the army at age twenty-four. He left the army after two years with an honorable discharge.
In 1957, Byck married a woman within a month of his father’s death, an act that his Jewish family felt was in bad taste. He tried to be a good husband and father to his four children but could not hold employment; this fact placed stress on his marriage. He failed in every job and business venture. His two brothers were financially successful, and he was jealous of them. Byck disowned his brothers, pretending that they had died by holding a Jewish ceremony to mourn their deaths.
Criminal Career
In November, 1968, Byck was arrested for receiving stolen goods, but his case was thrown out of court in May, 1969. In 1969, Byck became angry at the federal government for rejecting his application for a twenty-thousand-dollar loan from the Small Business Administration to promote his business idea of selling at shopping centers the automobile tires from school buses. Byck was admitted to a psychiatric hospital for anxiety after his loan application was rejected; there, he was diagnosed as a manic-depressive (suffering from bipolar disorder).
Byck viewed his mental health problems as a product of his bad marriage and financial troubles, but he also viewed his personal problems as symptomatic of the political corruption of the Richard Nixon administration. He began to identify with the poor and minorities in society who were disadvantaged by the political system, and he perceived successful persons, such as his brothers, as “sell-outs.”
Byck had been questioned by the Secret Service because he had suggested in conversations that someone should kill Nixon. The Secret Service, however, did not view him as a threat. He attended the inauguration of Nixon in 1973 and spoke with police officers and security personnel. On Christmas Day, 1973, Byck dressed up as Santa Claus and demonstrated outside the White House.
Byck and his wife eventually divorced, and he was allowed to see his children for only one hour per week. This was unbearable for him so he began to plot the assassination of Nixon because he wanted his life to mean something. Byck became inspired by a man named Jimmy Essex, who killed six people by shooting from the top of a hotel in New Orleans. Byck devised a plan he called Operation Pandora’s Box: He would hijack an airplane and crash it into the White House. Byck made tape recordings about his life frustrations and mailed the recordings to famous people such as composer Leonard Bernstein and physicianJonas Salk.
On February 22, 1974, Byck attempted to hijack Delta Flight 523 at the Baltimore-Washington International Airport. Byck shot and killed a police officer and then shot and killed one of the pilots before he was shot through a window of the plane by a police officer. As he lay wounded, Byck shot himself in the temple to end his own life.
Impact
The Federal Aviation Administration published a document in 1987 on Samuel Byck’s attempted hijacking to remind people about the potential dangers involved in civil aviation. In 2004, Byck gained notoriety when Sean Penn portrayed him in the film The Assassination of Richard Nixon. Byck also is portrayed in the Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman musical Assassins, which opened on Broadway in 2004. Finally, Byck gained some attention in the early twenty-first century when the 9/11 Commission mentioned his attempt to fly an airplane into the White House.
Bibliography
Clarke, James W. “Samuel Byck.” In American Assassins: The Darker Side of Politics. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1982. In a book in which Clarke develops a typology for analyzing sixteen political assassins throughout American history, chapter 4 is devoted to Byck.
Sondheim, Stephen, and John Weidman. Assassins. 1991. Reprint. Bronxville, N.Y.: PS Classics, 2004. The script, lyrics, and musical score for a Broadway play based upon assassins and would-be assassins of presidents of the United States.