{"id":395043,"date":"2026-08-01T22:23:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-01T22:23:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/395043\/"},"modified":"2026-08-01T22:23:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-01T22:23:09","slug":"ut-austin-police-apd-honor-those-lost-on-60th-anniversary-of-ut-tower-shooting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/395043\/","title":{"rendered":"UT Austin Police, APD honor those lost on 60th anniversary of UT Tower shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>AUSTIN, Texas  \u2014 Saturday marks 60 years since 17 people were killed and 31 were injured in a shooting at the University of Texas Austin Tower.<\/p>\n<p>The event occurred on August 1st, 1966, when Charles J. Whitman opened fire from the tower and continued shooting for nearly 90 minutes. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The 1966 Tower shooting was a turning point in law enforcement history,&#8221; said the UT Austin Police Department in a post on X. &#8220;It underscored the need for stronger training, communication, tactical response, and coordinated command, while helping shape the creation of campus police departments in Texas, including The University of Texas at Austin Police Department in 1967.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>RELATED:  <a href=\"https:\/\/cbsaustin.com\/newsletter-daily\/americas-first-modern-mass-shooting-never-really-ended-odessa-killeen-victims-clock-tower-texas-gunman-officers-school-shootings-military-fort-hood\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">America&#8217;s first modern mass shooting never really ended<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Among those that were killed was Austin Police Officer Billy Speed. Officer Speed was eating lunch in a nearby caf\u00e9 when he heard the rifle fire and went to investigate. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our department and community will never forget Officer Speed&#8217;s heroic actions that fateful day,&#8221; said the Austin Police department in a post on X. <\/p>\n<p>UT Austin stated that they will continue to honor those impacted by the shooting, as well as their commitment to serving the Longhorn community with professionalism, integrity, and dedication. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"AUSTIN, Texas \u2014 Saturday marks 60 years since 17 people were killed and 31 were injured in a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395044,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":["post-395043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395043\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}