40 years later, family uses hostage event for good

By JOE GORMAN

jgorman@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

Photo

PAUL R. SCHELL | VINDICATOR FILE PHOTO Carla Blair-Bohannon drops one of her children from a window while being held hostage by a bank-robbery suspect in 1977. Blair-Bohannon later escaped the ordeal.

When Carla Blair-Bohannon had a chance to drop her kids out of the window 40 years ago, she took it.

Held hostage by an armed bank robber taking refuge in her Gluck Street apartment for more than 20 hours on May 14 and 15, 1977, Blair-Bohannon threw her oldest son, Isaac Blair, then 4, out of the window first because he was older – and she thought he would not be as seriously injured if someone below dropped him.

When Isaac was caught by an officer below, she next dropped her daughter, Danielle Blair-Moses, then 18 months, to a waiting police officer. Blair-

Bohannon escaped her apartment a short time later, and the man eventually was arrested.

Blair-Bohannon said she uses the incident often in her life to tell people they can overcome adversity, and she was reminded of it again May 21, when an iconic photo of the children being dropped to police was published in the Years Ago section of The Vindicator.

The photo, taken by former Vindicator photographer Paul R. Schell, shows Danielle being tossed out of the window as a police officer runs toward safety with Isaac, who was tossed out moments before. The suspect, Archie Reginold Nelson, was later arrested after giving up. Charges against him in state court were dropped because he was declared insane.

Nelson had just robbed the Dollar Bank in the Lincoln Knolls Plaza on the East Side when he fled and went to Gluck Street, which is behind the plaza, where he encountered Isaac and a friend playing outside. He used the children to force his way inside the apartment.

Blair-Bohannon said when she saw the photo last month, she felt people needed to know they can come back after a rough period of their life.

“You can still make it,” she said. She said she uses the example when she speaks to people she knows who are in a rough spot.

Blair-Bohannon said it took about six months for her life to get back on track after the hostage incident. She said her strong faith in God led her through it, but she was concerned for her children.

She worked a series of jobs before settling in at J.C. Penney, where she worked for 20 years before retiring. The former East Sider now lives on the North Side.

Danielle, an adjunct professor at Eastern Gateway Community College, said she has no memory of the ordeal, but her brother said he remembers it vividly.

“I just specifically remember him coming down the walkway,” Isaac said.

Isaac, who spoke by phone from Cleveland, where he works as a pharmacist, said he tried to shut the door on Nelson before he got inside the apartment. He said he knew something was wrong right away.

“I knew this man didn’t belong in our house,” Isaac said.

Isaac said when his mother went to throw him out of the window, he did not understand what was going on. He joked that he tried to hold onto the window.

“I’m scared of heights today,” he said. His sister added she is scared of heights, too.

“As a 4-year-old, it was mentally exhausting,” Isaac said of the ordeal.

Now, he said, he uses the ordeal as an example that a person can survive a tough time and thrive afterward.

“I try to use it as an example of ‘positive trauma,’ that we can learn from that ordeal in the first place,” Isaac said.

Danielle and Isaac both credited their mother for her strength when they were held hostage. Danielle said the incident made an already close family closer.

“I developed a really close bond with my mother,” Danielle said. “My mother made sure to instill values in us. You should always be able to get past your difficulties. You apply that to our situation, and that’s basically what she did.”

“I’m so proud of my kids,” Blair-Bohannon said. “I didn’t worry when they grew up.”

Nelson ended up going through the criminal justice and mental health system until 1996, when he was convicted of the 1989 murder in Massillon of a woman whose body was dumped in Hubbard Township. He died of natural causes in his prison cell at age 50 in 1999.