Gang Lu

Infobox Person
name = Gang Lu


image_size = 200px
birth_date = 1963
birth_place = Beijing, China
death_date = November 1, 1991 (aged 28)
death_place = Iowa City, Iowa, USA
death_cause = Self-inflicted gunshot
nationality = Chinese
known_for = University of Iowa shooting
education = Graduate student

Gang Lu (c. 1963 – November 1, 1991) (surname Lu; Chinese: Lú Gāng) was the gunman in the University of Iowa shooting. He was a graduate student in physics at the university. He was 28 when he died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after shooting and killing five people and seriously wounding a sixth.

Motives and events leading to the shooting

Lu had received his doctoral degree the previous May. Months before the shootings, he wrote five letters explaining the reasons for his planned actions. According to university officials, four of the letters are in English and were intended to be sent to news organizations. One is in Chinese. The letters have not been released to the public. According to the university, Lu said in the letters that he was angry and jealous that his doctoral dissertation had not received a prestigious academic award. Linhua Shan, another student, had received the award.

University of Iowa Shooting

On Friday, November 1, 1991, using a .38-caliber revolver and a .22 caliber handgun, he shot and killed five people on the Iowa campus in Iowa City, seriously wounded and paralyzed another, and then turned the gun on himself and committed suicide.

Those killed in Van Allen Hall, the physics department's building, were Christoph K. Goertz, a professor in the department and Lu's academic advisor; Dwight R. Nicholson, chairman of the physics and astronomy department; Robert Alan Smith, an assistant professor; and Shan, the fellow physics graduate student, also from China. T. Anne Cleary, the assistant vice president for academic affairs, was killed in Jessup Hall, the main administration building, where a student employee, Miya Rodolfo-Sioson, was shot in the spine, permanently paralyzing her arms and legs.

Writings and films

Writer Jo Ann Beard later wrote an acclaimed personal essay based in part on the killings. The essay, called "The Fourth State of Matter," was originally published in "The New Yorker", appeared in the 1997 edition of "Best American Essays", and was later published in her collection of personal essays, "The Boys of My Youth". Beard worked as an editor for a physics journal at the university and was a colleague of the victims, working closely with several of them.

Based on Gang Lu's story, director Chen Shi-zheng made a feature film, "Dark Matter", starring Liu Ye and Meryl Streep. The film won the Alfred P. Sloan Prize at the Sundance Film Festival in 2007. [Overbye, "A Tale of Power and Intrigue in the Lab, Based on Real Life."] Another film that explored the socio-economic and cultural pressures on Asian students in U.S. campuses is Georgia Lee's "Educated" (2001).

Notes

Books

*cite book
last = Chen
first = Edwin
authorlink =
coauthors =
year = 1995
chapter =
title = Deadly Scholarship: The True Story of Lu Gang and Mass Murder in America's Heartland
publisher = Carol Publishing Corporation
location =
id = ISBN 155972241X

Web

*cite web
last = Beard
first = Jo Ann
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
year = 1997
month =
url = http://www.courses.vcu.edu/ENG101-pas/fourthstate.htm
title = The Fourth State of Matter
format =
work = The Boys of My Youth
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2007-04-01
accessyear =
*cite web
last = Eckhardt
first = Megan L.
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
date = November 1, 2001
month =
url = http://www.uwire.com/content/topnews110101001.html
title = 10 years later, U. Iowa remembers fatal day
format =
work = The Daily Iowan
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2007-04-01
accessyear =
*cite web
last = Efrati
first = Amir
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
date = November 1, 2002
month =
url = http://media.www.dailyiowan.com/media/storage/paper599/news/2002/11/01/Metro/Recalling.A.Snowy.Blustery.November.Day-312815.shtml
title = Recalling a snowy, blustery November day
format =
work = The Daily Iowan (dailyiowan.com)
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2007-04-01
accessyear =
*cite web
last = Grabbe
first = Crockett
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
date = November 2, 1999
month =
url = http://www.physics.uiowa.edu/~cgrabbe/writing/uimurds.html
title = A Tree of Legacies: The UI Murders 5 Years Later
format =
work = [e-mail]
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2006-07-25
accessyear =
*cite web
last = Marriott
first = Michel
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
date = November 3, 1991
month =
url = http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=9D0CE0DB1538F930A35752C1A967958260
title = Gunman in Iowa Wrote of Plans In Five Letters
format =
work = The New York Times
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2006-07-25
accessyear =
*cite web
last = Marriott
first = Michel
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
date = November 4, 1991
month =
url = http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=9D0CE5DB1538F937A35752C1A967958260
title = Iowa Gunman Was Torn by Academic Challenge
format =
work = The New York Times
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2006-07-25
accessyear =
*cite web
last = Overbye
first = Dennis
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
date = March 27, 2007
month =
url = http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/27/science/27dark.html?ei=5087%0A&em=&en=60699d2d8b90a79f&ex=1175227200&pagewanted=all
title = A Tale of Power and Intrigue in the Lab, Based on Real Life
format =
work = The New York Times
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2007-04-01
accessyear =
*cite web
last = Allen
first = Mary
authorlink =
coauthors =
date =
date = June 30, 2007
month =
url = http://www.press-citizen.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070630/OPINION02/706300301/1018
title = What's wrong with 'Dark Matter': 'Gang Lu was not a hero'
format =
work = Iowa City Press-Citizen
pages =
publisher =
language =
accessdate = 2007-06-30
accessyear =