Remembering a college class on terrorism

May 11, 2013

Another news report I heard this week on WUNC was that Campbell University now has a Homeland Security degree to teach students about “domestic and international terrorist groups and delve into the background of countries where terror organizations have historically formed.”

More than 20 years ago, I took a class at John Carroll University about the psychology of terrorism. Thomas Evans, who had profiled terrorist groups for the CIA, taught us about the various groups and individuals — Carlos the Jackal, Hezbollah, Osama bin Laden, Red Brigades, and others — who were behind bombings and hijackings and killings around the world. Professor Evans is still teaching at Carroll. I’m sure his terrorism classes are as interesting, and timely, as ever.

The class I took with Evans was taught in the Bohannon Science Center, an ugly building that was replaced by a parking lot when the new Dolan Science Center was built. I wrote about that in my Northern Ohio Live innovations column. I also blogged about the seismograph that was in the Bohannon foyer, the machine of one of the Jesuit priests who was an earthquake expert.

Anton Zuiker ☄