‘Gunclingers’: Aurora, Assault Weapons and the Rise of Mass Shootings I spoke this morning with James Alan Fox, who said mass killings were not unknown in the U.S. prior to 1966 — when Charles Whitman took to the Texas tower with an arsenal and began picking off civilians — but they were exceedingly infrequent. Ever since 1976, we’ve been averaging more than 20 per year. […]