This is the memory palace of Nate DeMao.
They could suddenly control time.
It changed everything.
Time was that if they wanted to blow something up,
they would have to throw a bomb themselves, which was dangerous beyond the obvious.
If you survived the throwing and the blowing up,
you'd have to get away if you wanted to get away with it.
But in the Civil War,
Confederate engineer had figured out a number of methods for attaching timers to incendiary devices.
They were crude and unreliable, but they were inspiring.
To militaries, to mining engineers, to saboteurs and murderers.
And they got better.
And by 1910 there were men, some unknown number, dozens,
likely more, men whose job was to place time bombs.
To travel the country, check into a hotel,
Build the bomb, sticks of dynamite, wires, an alarm clock,
check out of the hotel, place the bomb, get on a train, and be long gone by the time it went off.
John McNamara charged 200 bucks for this work.
I do not know if that included expenses or not, or if he had to cover the trip to Los Angeles,
or the hotel on Fifth Street downtown,