The Kelayres massacre was a shooting attack that took place the evening of November 5, 1934 in the coal-mining village of Kelayres, Pennsylvania. An election-eve parade and rally by Democrats was fired on by multiple shooters as it passed the home of Joseph James Bruno, known as "Big Joe", the local Republican boss. Three victims died almost immediately and two others died over the next two days.
The attack received national news coverage, and accounts of it shared the front page with early election news in several major newspapers. The top newly elected Pennsylvania Democrats attended the funerals. Six members of the Bruno family were eventually found guilty of multiple murder charges in four trials, with Bruno and his brother Phil receiving life sentences.
Bruno escaped from prison, leading to the then-largest manhunt in Pennsylvania history. He was caught eight months later.
All of the Bruno family members were eventually paroled. None ever admitted guilt, and no motive was ever formally established.
Background
Kelayres is a small community of about five city blocks by ten. Surrounded by coal mines, slag heaps, and a reservoir, there are only two streets that connect Kelayres to the neighboring towns of McAdoo and McAdoo Heights.
Joseph James Bruno was the first child of James Biaggio and Marie Antonia (Abbato) Bruno. James Biaggio Bruno first emigrated from Italy in 1877, and went back several times, in 1882 marrying Marie Antonia (Abbato). Marie and their son, Joseph, emigrated in 1886, on one of James' return voyages, well after James settled in Kelayres, making way for his young family. They were from a small village called Bucita, in Cosenza region of Calabria, Italy.
In Kelayres, the elected school boards had the power to hire and fire schoolteachers, and related contract work was subject to cronyism. A 1907 election which many locals considered questionable led to Bruno becoming school board director and a cousin Louis the school principal. Brother Philip also became a tax collector.
From this point, Bruno's influence grew. He would serve as justice of the peace, county detective, and an officer at the bank. He ran a garage which maintained the local school buses. He also ran slot machines and bootlegged coal. In nearby Pottsville, he ran a brothel. Critics claimed he abused his powers to enforce loyalty.
In 1932, the old wooden schoolhouse burned down. Bruno led the construction of a new building, the "Bruno School". His brother Louis, the acknowledged brains of the family, was killed in an automobile accident, and Bruno's ways of dealing with opposition became cruder and more antagonizing.
On a national level, in 1932, Roosevelt and the Democrats swept most of the country, but not Pennsylvania. Nevertheless, Pennsylvania Democrats felt they had made progress, and campaigned heavily in local elections in 1933 and 1934.
In Kelayres, a rival family, members of the McAloose clan swept the local 1933 elections, advocating a teachers' union and other protections against nepotism and cronyism. But Bruno, in his role as justice of the peace, took the ballot box and kept it in his house for several days before turning it over to an election judge for a recount, who ruled in favor of Bruno and the Republicans. The Democrats challenged the recount in the courts. Meanwhile, neither faction recognized the other's legitimacy, resulting in competing slates of schoolteachers, tax collectors, and bus drivers. A court issued a temporary injunction in favor of Bruno. His challengers occupied the school at the beginning of September 1934, and open brawling broke out, leaving the school physically unusable until November.
The Brunos lived mostly barricaded in their houses during this time. They received bomb threats, and even the women took to carrying clubs just to go to church.
Fourth and Center
Fourth Street runs north-south, Center Street runs west-east. The southwest corner of their intersection was occupied by the Bruno house. Built in 1927, a brick house with 12-inch thick walls, it was the most expensive house in the township, worth more than twice the second most expensive.
Just west of the Bruno house were a pool hall and a saloon, both owned by Bruno. The pool hall served as Republican party headquarters. The saloon was rented to Tony Cara, who along with most of his customers, was anti-Bruno by 1934. Immediately south of the Bruno house, on Fourth, was the home of son James.
Across the street on the northwest corner was the Marko building, occupied by A. J. Payer's butcher shop and two families, including the Fiorillas, who had switched allegiance from Bruno to McAloose, in politics and in a marriage.