Winnetka School Shooting Remembered 30 Years On

WINNETKA, IL — Three decades after a mentally ill babysitter went on a violent spree across the North Shore, shattering the community's sense of safety and signaling a new era of modern school shootings, the scars remain for the survivors. Sunday's anniversary comes three days after a mass shooting at a school in Texas killed 10 and less than a week after an Illinois student brought a rifle to the graduation rehearsal of his former high school.

The horrifying Winnetka school shooting seemed at the time to be exceptional, unique and unpredictable, coming amid a day of violence in affluent suburban communities. However, in the years since, the United States has accrued a macabre collection of school shootings. So far in 2018, there have been more than 20 school shootings – about one every week.

But 30 years ago, it shocked a nation.

On May 20, 1988, Laurie Dann, a 30-year-old Glencoe babysitter, targeted dozens of people in a series of attacks. She brought three guns to Hubbard Woods Elementary school, where she fatally shot 8-year-old Nicky Corwin and wounded five other students.

The school shooting came after she attempted to poison family members, acquaintances and local children, ignite a fire bomb at Ravinia Elementary School in Highland Park and bring a can of gasoline into a local daycare. Later that day, she took a Winnetka family hostage, shooting one man before taking her own life during a standoff with police.

Ahead of the 30th anniversary of the incidents, Winnetka District 36 issued the following statement explaining why there would be no formal memorial at Hubbard Woods this year:

These past three decades, our educators, alumni, and Village have courageously moved forward from the tragic events that took place on May 20, 1988. The Winnetka Public Schools does not plan to have a formal recognition of the 1988 incident as we feel it is not developmentally appropriate and may be alarming for our students. Rather, it is our hope that we can collectively appreciate the resilience and beauty of the school community we share at Hubbard Woods.

As we reflect on the events of 30 years ago, we are grateful for a supportive community that has helped us move forward from tragedy and flourish decades later. We remain vigilant in keeping our schools safe and have strong relationships with the Winnetka police and fire departments. In The Winnetka Public Schools, we are committed to nurturing the social and emotional well-being of our children.

While our hearts are with all who were impacted by the events of May 20, 1988, we know that day does not define Hubbard Woods School. Our shared commitment to our children, families and greater community is what defines Hubbard Woods School and helps us thrive 30 years later.

By sharing his story, one of the survivors from the incident is committed to helping others who have experienced trauma understand their feelings and heal.

Peter Munro, 38, was a second grader at Hubbard Woods in 1988 when he was shot in the hand and the stomach. Now a clinical social worker in Chicago, Munro recently published a 23-page autobiographical essay on his website, Living After Trauma.

Munro recalls his struggles with post-traumatic stress, anxiety and trust issues resulting from the shooting and his road to better understanding how the experience affected him. His powerful account offers advice and hope to anyone working through trauma and its effects.

Read excerpt from Living After Trauma by Peter Munro:

This story begins in my second grade classroom at Hubbard Woods Elementary School in Winnetka Illinois on May 20th 1988. My teacher, Ms. Dueble was out for the day so we had a substitute. It was a beautiful spring day and I was very excited because our class was scheduled to take the bicycle safety test that morning. If I passed, I would be able to ride my bike to school every day. It's a little silly to think about that because our house was right across the street from the school. You could literally see the school out of our front window.

I grew up in Winnetka Illinois. Winnetka is a suburb on the north shore near Chicago. We had beaches nearby, a big park across the street, a downtown area I could walk to if I wanted to get a hot dog, or buy some baseball cards. It was an idyllic place where we all felt sheltered from the crime and violence that is so rampant in Chicago. We knew our neighbors and I hung around the neighborhood with my friends. The schools were good and opportunities for success were in abundance.

At school I could hardly stay in my seat that morning because I was so excited about the bike test. We had a brief morning meeting and then went outside to the playground for the road portion of the bike test. We slowly rode our bikes through a course that had some modest obstacles. I navigated the stop sign and cones with expertise. When I learned that I had passed the road portion of the test, I was very happy, but was still nervous about the upcoming written portion. I was insecure because I knew I was neither the most disciplined nor focused student. As a matter of fact, I was a bit wild. As the youngest of four siblings, I got away with things that my older siblings would not have. When I was in kindergarten I had to go sit on "the chair" everyday as a consequence for my not staying on the rug during story time. I was high energy and liked to push limits and make jokes. My three older siblings taught me to question authority and to think independently.

After we got back to the classroom I sat down at a table with some friends to begin the test. We sat at small round tables, about five or six of us per table. It was quiet as we were all taking the bike safety test very seriously. I was sitting at a small table with some other classmates. Suddenly, I heard loud noises and a flurry of commotion. I don't remember faces, just a feeling of disorganization, intensity and terror. I fell to the ground and blacked out.

The next thing I remember was crawling in the hallway by myself. The hallway felt so empty. It felt like the whole school had been abandoned. It was calm and quiet. My hand hurt really bad. It was a stinging pain. I looked at it and saw that it was bleeding in a way I had never seen before. There was a hole in it and blood was pouring out of the hole in rhythm with my pulse. I remember the color of the blood. It was dark, almost black. My hand was covered in blood and I was looking at it pulsing, trying to figure out what happened. It was almost mesmerizing. I didn't know what had happened. All I knew was that I was in pain and I was scared.

I tried to make sense of what was going on. I remember thinking that this must be some sort of safety drill. I thought that the school was preparing us for something. I went so far as to imagine that the person who came into the room was the school janitor who I liked and trusted. I thought that he came into our classroom and shot me with some sort of fake gun and that I would be okay.

I kept trying to understand what was happening. I remember being afraid, confused and shocked. I looked down and my clothes were covered in blood. I was bleeding out of my stomach. The amount of blood coming out of my stomach was much more than out of my hand, but my hand hurt much worse, a pain like I was stung by a hundred bees. My clothes were soaking wet with blood. As I slowly crawled towards the exit, I left a trail of blood behind me. I was confused and then started to feel scared. I knew something was very wrong. What was happening? Was I okay? I was hurting so bad and I was starting to get cold and tired.

An adult swooped into the hallway, picked me up and took me into another classroom. I could sense that something was very wrong by how he was acting. I could tell that he was scared. This made me even more afraid. The room he brought me to had first graders in it. I remember them looking at me as I bled and bled. As I was held in the man's arms I remember everyone's faces. The man holding me looked terrified. I could feel him shaking and saw him sweating. The first graders didn't look as scared, but they knew something was wrong. I knew somehow that they shouldn't be seeing me like this. I didn't know why, but I wanted the kids to look away.

I started to feel overwhelmed with emotion. I started to feel my emotions in my body. I was shaking. I felt very tense. Then I started hysterically crying. I wanted my mom. I was shaking, crying and screaming for my mom. I wanted to know everything was going to be okay. I cried and cried yelling out for her. Then, once again, my memory blacks out.

I somehow ended up back in my classroom. The next thing I remember is when the paramedics came. I remember waking up and looking at their faces. I saw that they were paying less attention to my hand and more to my stomach. My stomach just felt cold and numb and my hand continued to sting in a very painful way. I could tell that they were afraid. I looked to my side while lying down and saw that the classroom was messy and everything seemed all over the place. I pieced together that the wound in my stomach was more severe than the wound in my hand because the paramedics were much more worried about it. My memory once again fades out.

Later I remember riding in the ambulance and talking to the paramedic. I was feeling very cloudy and disconnected. I told him that I was tired. I could see the fear on his face. He told me not to go to sleep, but I felt so tired. I was so cold and so tired, but also very, very calm. I went to sleep.

What I learned later was that a 30 year old mentally ill woman from Highland Park had come to my school and opened fire for no rational reason. She killed one of my friends and wounded five others, including myself. She then broke into a home, shot a young man inside and killed herself.

The next memory I have is when I was in the hospital. My body hurt, breathing hurt and I had tubes in my stomach, a catheter and a tube up my nose. There was a cast on my arm. I was confused, but also very tired. I had a big bandage on my stomach and beneath it were staples. Instead of stitches, staples were holding my stomach together. They looked really weird and looking at them gave me the chills. It was like a silver centipede climbed onto my stomach and its claws were stuck inside of me. It was strange to be afraid of my own body.

In the hospital, my parents did their best to explain what happened. They told me that I had been shot. They told me that several other classmates were shot as well. They also told me that one of my classmates did not survive. His name was Nick Corwin. It seems like cliché, but Nick was truly the most popular, nicest, smartest and well liked kid in my class. He was mature way beyond his years and I always looked up to him. I remember not understanding what happened. I definitely did not have an emotional reaction to this information other than confusion. I didn't feel anything that strongly, maybe it was because I was on heavy medication, maybe because the physical pain was too much for me to feel anything else. Maybe I had to turn off my emotions and just focus on surviving. I did see how upset my family was. I would later learn that I would spend the rest of my life understanding the emotional significance of this event.

My family told me that a woman came into my classroom and shot us. They told me that I was safe because she was dead. I was confused and afraid. They did not know why she did any of this.

My recovery was long and painful. I was sore and weak. I hated when the nurses would come in to draw blood throughout the day and in the middle of the night. I really hated all the tubes in me. The catheter was very uncomfortable. I also really disliked the tube that went through my nose and into my stomach. Some of the most painful and uncomfortable times involved that nose tube. The tubes made me feel held captive. It felt like the tubes chained me to the hospital bed. My memories of this time are foggy. I knew something significant had happened, but was not in a place to really understand what or why. Mostly, I reacted to other people's reactions. I began to understand that this must be something very serious simply because everyone around me seemed so upset about it.

I was so weak that I had trouble walking. I was stuck in the hospital bed. It felt like everyone else was out enjoying the summer and I was stuck in bed. Eventually I gained back my strength and was able to walk around the hospital unit, but that wasn't enough. I wanted out. I wanted back to my life. It felt horrible that I was stuck in the hospital during summer break. I wanted to be outside hanging out with my friends and family. I wasn't angry then, but when I look back to this time now it makes me angry. Getting shot hurt, but the recovery was much worse. I lost a part of myself and part of my life. At the time I just wanted life to go back to normal. I wanted to get the hell out of the hospital and be better.

...

I first remember feeling anxiety when I was about ten or eleven years old. I remember being able to imagine terrible things happening to me. I would be scared that someone was going to break into the house and kill me. I feared that people in passing cars would shoot me. I remember feeling very afraid at times. Similar to the fear I felt when I was in the hallway after being shot. The fear was not felt just in my head, but also in my body. I would feel my heart rate go up, my thoughts would feel faster and I sometimes wouldn't remember what happened minutes before. I didn't have these experiences very frequently, maybe once or twice a year. I remember not wanting to tell anyone about my fears. I wanted everyone to think that I was doing fine. I did not want to go back to the hospital.

Every now and again I was encouraged to go see a therapist. I was told by my mom that I needed to talk about what happened. The few times I went I would tell my story, the therapist would be really emotionally affected and I wouldn't feel any better. I remember going to see a therapist who had a beard when I was 9 or 10 years old. He had puzzles and stuff and I remember not really understanding what I was supposed to be doing with him. I remember thinking that I was supposed to be sadder about what happened than I was. It seemed like everyone was just waiting for me to have some sort of emotional breakdown because of what happened to me. It felt like everyone was trying to have me feel sad and upset, but I didn't. It felt like my parents, teachers and therapists expected me to have problems. I wanted to prove everyone wrong. I wanted to be okay and move on with my life and not have to deal with the emotional effects of the shooting.

...

I decided that I wanted to go to therapy. This was the first time in my life that I decided to go to therapy on my own. I was twenty five years old and had just been broken up with by my girlfriend that I had been together with since college. I wanted to talk about how I was anxious. I didn't want to talk about my drinking, depression or that I may or may not have symptoms of PTSD. I felt like anxiety was more socially acceptable. It's so much more visible in popular culture. I think of George Costanza on Seinfeld, or Woody Allen. They are lovable, not dark and twisted. It seemed easier for me to stomach that I was anxious than accepting that my anxiety was a symptom of something much deeper, but that is what I would soon come to find out.

I was referred to a therapist through UIC, where I was getting my masters in Social Work. I met with her at varying frequency over the span of about a year and a half. She challenged me to accept that my trauma affected me. She challenged me to consider how drinking was not helping me. She challenged me to accept that I had symptoms of PTSD. After I stopped seeing her I continued to struggle with some anxiety and depression, but everything seemed more manageable. I did not feel as alone. I was finally able to listen and receive help. I learned that when I had problems, I was better able to understand them and process through them. I was better able to ask for help.

By going to therapy on my own volition I also was able to separate help from having to be stuck in a hospital bed. I think that I associated the shooting with me being trapped in the hospital, so talking about it meant being trapped and controlled. I learned that I could control my life and that accepting that getting shot changed me did not mean that I was losing anything.

My process of accepting help was complicated. I needed to get treatment at my own pace. I remember going to therapy at times and not being ready to confront issues that were brought to me, issues that I am now very accepting of. After getting shot I desperately needed to observe and experience that life goes on. I needed to know that I could try to be normal. It was not until I realized on my own that I had trouble at life did I realize that I wanted help. I had to want help for myself and for reasons that I could understand. Reasons like feeling very anxious, feeling depressed, struggling in relationships and having problems with intimacy. I remember many people telling me, with good intentions that I should go to therapy when I was younger, but I really was not able to get much out of it until I became ready myself.

Dealing with shame and anger has been a big part of my recovery from trauma. Much of this is related to society's response to my getting shot. I felt ashamed for causing pain to people when I told my story. I felt shame that I survived and my friend didn't. I felt ashamed for being different. I felt ashamed for the idea that people in the community would ask my siblings, "How's Peter doing, no, how is he REALLY doing?" Like I should be messed up. It makes me angry that I'm expected to have problems because of what someone did to me. When I was in my teens I don't think I was able to be angry about getting shot as I felt that I should just be happy to be alive. I think I was afraid that if I were to get in touch with that anger that it would be too much for me. Then I started to realize that accessing some of that anger was Okay and was not going to overwhelm me.

I have found it difficult to find an appropriate target for my anger. Getting angry at the shooter has been hard because I didn't know her. It's not like someone close was taking advantage of or hurting me. She was a complete stranger. I can get angry about the ridiculousness of the action. Going to a grade school to shoot kids is terrible. Who does that? It is also further complicated by the fact that the woman who shot me killed herself that same day. I am conflicted about this as I don't want to know her because I hate her for what she did, but her existence could possibly help me make more sense of what happened. I also think that some of my anger towards the woman who shot me comes out in a deep desire for accountability. I am very focused on rules and consequences. This may also be related to issues of trust, but I feel that if someone commits a crime, they should have consequences. The fact that the woman shot and killed herself presented me with closure, but it was closure that I couldn't control. It was forced upon me.

I have found myself wanting to ask the woman who shot me: Why did my life have to change so much? I wasn't doing anything wrong. I did not deserve punishment and even if I did who are you to punish me? Why do you get to decide who lives and dies and who gets to live with scars the rest of their lives? I wish this never happened. It was such a stupid and horrible thing for you to do. I truly hate that it happened and I hate you for doing it for no good reason.

Perhaps my anger is pent up as I have not yet had an opportunity to publicly share my side of the story. I have always felt that no one could handle or understand it. I've felt like I need to edit myself to make those I love comfortable. I have felt like those who love me don't want me to be angry. Now is my chance to express it. So, the uncensored description of my experience of getting shot at the age of eight and having to live the rest of my life with that experience as a part of me is that it sucks. It has been very hard, I have been very angry. I never asked for this to happen and I hate that it has affected me so much. I hate that there seems to be an asterisk next to my name, indicating that for me to simply be living and functioning is some sort of an accomplishment. I hate that I am "special". I hate that I had no choice for privacy. No one asked me if I wanted this to be private. I did not deserve this. You caused me physical and psychological pain that I still feel today. That is not oaky and I hope you can know that pain you have caused. But you probably don't, you were oblivious, angry and psychotic. I hate that I can't blame you, but that I sometimes take my anger out on those I love. I do want to ask you why? What were you trying to accomplish? Why did you shoot me, I never even met you. You could have expressed your pain in a million other ways, but you choose to shoot a bunch of kids and kill one of them. What a terrible way to handle whatever pain you were experiencing. Your decision was a horrible one and didn't accomplish anything. What you did was not fair. I was just a second grader who was excited to be taking the bike safety test. I just wanted to be able to ride my bike to school. What you did changed my life forever and I hate you for it. It is also painful that I don't even know you and that you killing yourself allowed for zero accountability for what you did to me. Now I have to tell a disturbing story all the time and it's all because of you. I don't want to disturb people. I don't want to feel this burden that I now need to do something "bigger" with my life because I'm lucky to be alive. I resent that I'm lucky to be alive. I just want to be alive.

The biggest dilemma I experienced with relation to my getting shot was learning who I am. I am what happened to me. I am the result of something terrible. When I look back on my life, memories before getting shot are faint and incoherent. The first distinct memories I have of my life is getting shot. I don't remember much else. This leaves me questioning what is me and what is the trauma? Am I outspoken and good at planning because of what happened to me or was it part of me before I got shot? I am a good planner and it works well in my marriage as my wife is more easy going. Would I be more easy going had I not gotten shot? I remember some things about myself before I got shot. I mostly remember relationships, like with my siblings, parents, friends at school and my first grade teacher. I remember that I was pretty wild. I was famous in my class for eating a bug that landed in our tadpole aquarium. I remember I was independent because I had problems sitting on that rug in kindergarten. Mostly I remember having fun and feeling loved.

However, I am not sure. These earlier memories are so faint and I wonder if they are even mine, or just me remembering stories about myself I was told by my family. The memories of the shooting are so clear in comparison. I will always remember looking at my hand as it pulsed out blood. I will always remember vomiting what felt like chunks of blood onto my parent's comforter. I cannot forget feeling so upset that summer about being stuck at Highland Park Hospital. Am I over-identifying with the "bad" memories and ignoring the happier ones? I don't know. These are questions that remain inside of me.

A major change I made in therapy was accepting that I needed help and that, in order to do so, I needed to let my guard down. I had to stop protecting myself when I didn't need to. I was protecting myself from being hurt again, but I was over protecting myself. I was shielding myself from future pain, but also shielding myself from care and love.

A mentor of mine once told me a story of a man who built a canoe to cross a river and from that point on dragged the canoe everywhere he went for the rest of his life. He wanted to know that he would be prepared if he ever needed to cross another river, but was also encumbered by having to drag a canoe with him everywhere. This is similar to my story. I was trying to protect myself from getting hurt, but I was also slowed down in my life because I was dragging around excessive self-protection.

In therapy I learned that I was coping with my trauma the best way I could, but that my coping techniques needed to be upgraded. When I was eight, I did not know the best way to cope with getting shot. In therapy I have learned that I can have compassion for my eight-year-old self and know that I did the best I could at the time.

I learned that I used two primary ways to cope with my problems: avoidance and control. I have worked on gradually easing my need for control. Finding activities where I can be more present has been very helpful. I learned to be more present when listening to music and going for long walks with my wife. For me anger can feel empowering, but it is often a response to more complex emotions. I have worked to better understand my anger and found that it often revolves around feelings of wanting to be in control.

I learned that I pushed my emotions down to feel more in control. I was afraid that if I felt my true emotions that they would be out of control, so not feeling was a way for me to be in control. I have learned that emotions do not need to be consuming. I can be angry, but that does not mean that it is all I feel and it does not mean that I am out of control. Thinking of emotional spectrums of intensity is helpful for me. If I'm sad, that does not mean I am immobilized by depression. If I'm anxious, that does not mean I am panic stricken. I have found for myself that when I am feeling something a little stronger than normal that communicating what I'm feeling can help it be understood and better managed than ignoring it.

...

I have become more compassionate and caring as I've acknowledged the true impact my trauma had on me. I have noticed that I've eased up on criticizing myself. I have problems just like everyone else. Some of them are related to my having been shot when I was a boy and others are not. I am finicky, impulsive, gluttonous and somewhat self-absorbed at times. I am not perfect, I never will be. But, I am able to love people and I do care deeply about others. I am able to help people at my job. I have been able to balance my perspective of myself. I am not all bad. I am not all weak. I have vulnerabilities; I am aware of some of them and am receptive to understanding more as they come up in my life. I also know that I have strengths. I know that my life has gone on and that I have been able to form meaningful connections with others. I am thankful that I am able to experience fatherhood. I am thankful that my symptoms have not made life so hard that I couldn't do this. I want to share this wonderful world with my daughter!

I have found that as I have changed my perspective of myself it has also changed my perspective of other people. I see strengths in people that I may have judged negatively in the past. People are complex and have many different facets. Some good, some bad. I have found myself more able to see the good in people than I have in the past. I used to focus on the bad in people to protect myself. If I knew someone was bad, I knew to avoid them so I wouldn't get hurt. But by avoiding them I was also missing out on their good parts. I have been able to see other people are capable of changing. I have changed, so others can too.

As I've moved through life stages I've changed quite a bit. I have had to shed my layers of what I mistakenly clung to for self-protection. I have learned that my shutting out my emotions caused me to miss out on a lot. I was faced with continuing to suffer as a result of my trauma, or confronting it and being able to open myself up to allow me to access so much more. I have found that in acknowledging my emotions I have been more vulnerable, but I have also been more alive. I am able to feel joy and happiness. In the past I shut those feelings down along with the negative ones. Its like emotions are sunlight. Sunlight can burn you, but it can also give you vitamin D and can lift your mood. I used to live under an umbrella to protect myself from being burned, but I also was blocking the positive parts of sunshine. Now I know how much sunblock to put on, when I need to sit in the shade and when to soak in the sun.

A NOTE OF ENCOURAGEMENT

I hope that you can read my story and find some sense of comfort. I want you to know that you are not alone and that there is help available. I urge you to take the help. You do not have to, but it may make things easier. I want you to honestly look at yourself and identify both you strengths and your vulnerabilities. Accept yourself at the place that you are right now. I feel that acceptance is much more productive than avoidance. Accept your pain and acknowledge it; do not run from it. View the world as bigger than just your life. That your own need for comfort may be limiting you. Your sole focus on surviving limits you from seeing so much beauty, love and care in the world.

There is a reason for why you act the way you do and that is because something terrible happened to you. I want you to accept that. That won’t be taken away, what happened happened and it hurt. You can be angry, sad, scared, or anything else. Do not disown your feelings. Running from them only makes them more destructive. Your feelings will not destroy you, avoiding them will. Confronting them will strengthen you. I urge you to contemplate if you are ready to try to move forward. Moving forward is not forgetting the past. It is simply looking at your life and thinking about if you want more. You can have more. It is out there. All you need to do is trust again. What happened to you made this hard to do, but do it anyway. Begin to trust in yourself and others; push yourself to do it. Maybe start with a therapist or family member. Be open and honest with him or her. Tell them if you are cynical of them. Tell them if you are scared. You are in control. You can stop if you need to. But try to tell your story. Try to understand how what happened to you affected you. Begin to accept yourself, particularly your feelings. Your feelings are not wrong even if they don’t make logical sense. Express them and then you and your therapist can begin to understand them. This will began the process of you moving out of survival mode.

Read Peter Munro's full story: Living After Trauma

Watch interviews with Peter Munro, former Winnetka Police Chief Herbert Timm and Phil Andrew from WGN: