On this day in 1972, Alabama Gov. George Wallace was shot during an outdoor rally for his presidential campaign at a shopping center in Laurel, Md.
Wallace was permanently paralyzed from the waist down and three others were wounded in the shooting by 21-year-old Arthur Bremer, who later said he was motivated by a desire for fame.
Bremer was convicted of attempted murder and was released from prison in 2007.
The shooting ended Wallace's surging bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, later won by George McGovern. Lt. Gov. Jere Beasley assumed his gubernatorial duties in Montgomery for a month while Wallace recovered in a Maryland hospital.
Wallace served as governor from 1963–1967, 1971–1979 and 1983–1987. In the late 1970s, he announced that he was a born-again Christian and apologized to black civil rights leaders for his past actions as a segregationist.
Wallace announced in 1986 that he would not seek a fifth term as governor and that he was retiring from politics.
In 1992, when asked to comment on the 20th anniversary of his attempted assassination, Wallace replied, "I've had twenty years of pain."
Wallace died in 1998 at age 79.
This day 1972, George Wallace was shot & paralyzed while campaigning in Democratic primary, Laurel, Maryland: twitter.com/BeschlossDC/st…— Michael Beschloss (@BeschlossDC) May 15, 2013