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Suicide of Terry Rossland

suicide of an American man from Butte, Montana (1952-1990)

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 9, 2026
Entity authorityQ23806430 ↗
Source-derived summary

Terry Lee Rossland (June 21, 1952 – October 9, 1990) was an American man from Butte, Montana, known for loading his car full of gasoline and pipe bombs in 1989, and then detonating the bombs in his car while seated inside it. Rossland was attempting suicide due to personal issues he was facing at the time. He managed to survive the suicide attempt, but he successfully took his life a year later by a drug overdose. His suicide attempt in his car is well known as it was filmed by bystanders. Numerous television programs relating to crime and extraordinary events caught on camera have featured the footage of the explosion. To this day, the footage is still used in law enforcement training.

Suicide attempt

On December 20, 1989, Rossland, a man with a history of mental illness, loaded his 1982 Dodge Colt Hatchback full of gasoline and pipe bombs with the intention of committing suicide. Rossland was depressed over his pending divorce with his wife and was despondent over the marital problems he was facing. Earlier that same day, his wife had obtained a restraining order to keep him away from her and their 15-year-old son. Rossland had also recently lost his job, and was unstable due to the amount of painkillers he had taken.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Suicide of Terry Rossland” is suicide of an American man from Butte, Montana (1952-1990). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Suicide, Terry and Rossland, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1952, 1990, 1989, 1982—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1952-06-21. For this dossier, Suicide, Terry and Rossland is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “suicide of an American man from Butte, Montana (1952-1990)” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q23806430. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1952, 1990, 1989 and 1982.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  2. Expand the search: follow Suicide of Terry Rossland primary sources, Suicide of Terry Rossland archive and Suicide research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Suicide of Terry Rossland” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.