The explosion near Jersey City was so colossal it felt like an earthquake for hundreds of miles around.
Black Tom, the former island just off the Hudson County coast, where two million pounds of ammunition and small arms were stored, was utterly razed. Thousands of windows in Manhattan were shattered, including the stained glass in St. Patrick’s Church. Fragments from the explosion slammed into the Statue of Liberty, forcing the permanent closure of the arm.
That was almost 100 years ago, in late summer 1916. At least four people were killed, hundreds injured. Property damage totaled many millions of dollars. The cause of the explosion was ruled an accident.
Until 1923. That’s when it was revealed that the devastation was intentionally caused by German saboteurs in the first tragic instance of domestic terrorism in New York Harbor.
“How come we didn’t know from 1916 to 1923 that the Germans came in and blew up half of Jersey City?” asked veteran newsman Ron Semple recently. “Two possible answers: incompetence of the investigators, or a political cover up.”
In his new book, Semple makes a convincing case for the latter. “[President Woodrow] Wilson is renominated in June [1916] on the slogan ‘He kept us out of war,’” explained Semple. “Black Tom blows up on the last days of July. If there’s ever a cause of war, this is it. But it’s ruled an accident. Wilson is elected on ‘He kept us out of war’ in November. It’s not until the following April that he declares war.”
“Black Tom: Terror on the Hudson” is a novel rooted in fact. The protagonist is a Jersey City policeman who begins to unravel a vast conspiracy involving politics both local and global. “It’s about sabotage at Black Tom and it is also about the rise of the Hague organization and their dominance in Jersey City,” said Semple.
Frank Hague was the notoriously corrupt politician who served as mayor of Jersey City from 1917 to 1947.
“This book writes itself,” laughed Semple. “I had a hell of a lot of fun writing it.”
Fact to fiction
“Black Tom” is Semple’s second novel. A Hudson County native, he now lives in North Carolina but brags that he never lost his Jersey accent. Semple’s 2006 novel, “Miss Bidwell’s Spirit,” was also set in Jersey City, albeit a thinly disguised one, dubbed River City.
The hero is a young, well-to-do girl who wants to be a reporter for the New York Times but settles for a job at the River City Dispatch, where she decides to make a name for herself by taking down a fictional mayor.
“‘Bidwell’ is my own personal experiences disguised,” said Semple. “It’s set during the Gulf War but a lot of the stories [in the book] date back to the ‘50s.”
“He called me a literary Grandma Moses because the first book I wrote was when I was 71.” – Ron Semple
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“Miss Bidwell’s Spirit,” his first novel, was written in collaboration with bestselling novelist Warren Murphy, co-creator of the massively popular series featuring “The Destroyer.”
“He called me a literary Grandma Moses because the first book I wrote was when I was 71,” said Semple.
The two writers have a long history together, having worked on the same Jersey newspaper in their youth. “He may have sold 60 million books but his real accomplishment is that he was the fastest and best rewrite man on the East Coast,” said Semple.
Murphy traded the newspaper business for a stint in local politics before settling on his career as a novelist. He reached out his old friend Semple one day to suggest collaborating on a book. “He’s deeply into death and destruction but he wanted to write a general story,” recalled Semple. “He said we should write about Jersey City. I came up with the idea of the reporter.”
Semple wrote the first draft and then Murphy took a crack at it. “He’s still the best rewrite man on the East Coast,” said Semple.
A fabulous life
Although he has traveled the world and lived across the country, Semple is at heart a Hudson County boy. “Till I was nine years old I lived with my grandma in North Bergen, three blocks from Jersey City,” he said. “There were six of us in a very small apartment with a kitchen the size of a large closet. We had no idea we were poor. I can’t imagine having a happier childhood.”
He graduated from grammar school in Union City and walked to visit relatives throughout the county. “Jersey City was an ethnic cafeteria, a very colorful place full of different immigrant groups. In my family we have Irish, Italian, Jews. We never felt threatened in any way by anybody,” he said. “Except the mothers on the block, they all felt free to whack us. They didn’t have to check with my mother, they had license.”
Semple attended college at Loyola University in New Orleans and enlisted in the marines at age 18. “I was a drill instructor at Parris Island and a rifle squad leader with the 4th Marines in the Pacific during the Korean war and after,” he said.
Then it was back to Hudson County, where he took a job with his stepfather, working at the Hoboken shipyards of Bethlehem Steel. While there he heard about an open position at the Dispatch and applied, having majored in journalism at Loyola. The editor was an ex-marine and that was that. The job went to Semple.
In 1965 he left the newspaper business to travel, becoming a merchant seaman, shipping out of New Orleans on the SS Del Rio to West Africa, “hitting all those countries now being ravaged by Ebola,” he said. After two and a half years he ran out of money and got a job in Montana, back in the newspaper business.
But that wasn’t enough. “Parallel to that I had a career in emergency services as a volunteer,” he said. “I became a firefighter at age 53, a paramedic at age 57, and then when I moved down to North Carolina at age 61 I joined the Coast Guard auxiliary and I went on a batch of search and rescue missions.”
Subsequent to that he served as deputy planning chief for the Marine Safety Office before joining FEMA at age 69 to work half a dozen hurricanes, including Sandy. “I was in Jersey City for over two months,” he said.
And now it’s time to settle into the next phase of his life. “I just quit FEMA,” he said. “I’m 80 years old. There’s no sense working 12 hour days anymore.”
Don’t expect him to slow down, though. “I have had a fabulous life. I have no talent for retirement,” he said. “I played golf once. I was about 20 years old and I thought it was a stupid game.”
“Black Tom: Terror on the Hudson” is scheduled for release later this summer.
Art Schwartz may be reached at arts@hudsonreporter.com.