The rise of the homespun thug

MARCUS DUFFIELD

We Americans have always been over-modest about our native talent for high crime and misdemeanor, and inclined to feel that outlaws, like opera singers, were mostly imported from abroad. Our national feeling of inferiority, in the fields of felony, has persisted in spite of the fact that it never was really justified. After all, the Jukes family was as thoroughly American as Daniel Boone—and dated back to his day. And if there are any Kallikaks around now, they are eligible for the D.A.R., because one ran away to fight for the Colonies against England.

Nevertheless, our disposition to blame aliens for lawlessness has been so firmly rooted that the Wickersham Commission devoted two years to finding out whether or not the belief was correct. Its verdict was that the foreign-born committed considerably fewer crimes, in proportion to their numbers, than the American native born. The report, which came out in 1931, seemed rather surprising, especially since foreign names had been so conspicuous in the crime headlines in the bootleg era. New Yorkers had been familiar with such figures as Ciro Terranova and Little Augie Pisano; Chicagoans had flinched at the mention of Torrio (Italian-born gang leader who gave A1 Capone his start) and the Genna brothers, late of Sicily.

Since 1931, outlawry has been in a troubled and transitional state, largely because of the exit of prohibition. Old celebrities have retired, new desperadoes have arisen. After the death of Dillinger, the Department of Justice mentioned some of the remaining killers it was eager to meet, and in this contemporary list of public enemies the names are American and easily pronounceable. At the head of the list is Charles ("Pretty Boy") Floyd; Nordic, blond, born in Georgia. Then come two able lieutenants of Dillinger: "Baby Face Nelson" (christened Lester M. Gillis), a Chicago boy who was an oiler by trade; and John Hamilton, whose folks come from northern Michigan.

The highly publicized alien gangsters of the liquor-running period have largely gone into eclipse. The kidnapers and other desperadoes who have blazed their way across the front pages in latter years have been, with very few exceptions, Americans. The Wickersham Commission's exoneration of foreigners is, therefore, truer today than when it was written. Conclusive data as to the birthplaces of our contemporary gunmen cannot be obtained, because even the Department of Justice apparently does not trouble to keep comprehensive records, but it seems safe to say that ninety per cent of them are homespun thugs. The Anglo-Saxon hoy is definitely making good as a big-lime had man in the modern machine-gun manner.

THE NATIVE CRIMINAL CAVALCADE.—fake, for example, Pretty Boy Floyd, unstained by alien strain, reared since childhood on a farm near the town of Sallisaw (population 2,000) in Oklahoma. A rugged individualist, he has risen by his own efforts to eminence in outlawry despite the fact that his education was cut short by his escape from the Ohio penitentiary before finishing the course. While he has not been associated with any kidnapings, nor has his career been as spectacular as that of Dillinger, Pretty Boy actually is a more competent and successful felon than Dillinger ever was, if for no other reason than that at this writing he is still at large. In the last few years insurance companies have paid out several hundred thousand dollars to hanks deprived of their currency by Pretty Boy, and the number of murders credited to him is now eleven.

They say that Pretty Boy Floyd was nursed on tales of Jesse James, A1 Jennings, and the Dalton gang, eminent highwaymen in the truest American tradition of the postCivil War period. Pretty Boy follows that tradition, hut not in so blind a manner as to keep him from improving upon the methods of his great predecessors. He wears a steel vest, has two .45 Colt automatics in holsters swung on his belt, and operates in a fast motor car in which, for precautionary reasons, are two machine guns. This superior equipment once enabled him to accomplish the dream of the Dalton gang—robbing two banks on the same day.

We find in Pretty Boy, among other American traits, that love of home and fireside so frequently remarked on by our orators. He does not stray far from his beloved bills of eastern Oklahoma, making it a practice to patronize home banks. One day at noon Pretty Boy walked into the Sallisaw bank less than two blocks from the Floyd family residence. He exchanged friendly grins with several old acquaintances, then realized that they mistook his business call for a social one. "This," he explained, "is a hold-up." It was. Pretty Boy told his associate, who was lining the people up at the point of his automatic, to be careful not to hurt them, as they were friends of his. The proceeds were $2,350.

Essentially, Pretty Boy is a case of Home Town Boy Makes Bad. The phrase expresses an important motive of his badness, a motive which is typical in the rise of the present-day American gunman. He is a small town boy with ambitions, yearning to be talked about, to make the headlines. Nowadays industry is so crystallized that the small town boy cannot hope to rise from milking cows to become, let us say, chairman of the board of the Santa Fe railway. But individual initiative will still get him to the top in crime, and speedily, too.

There is another motivation, usually overlooked by sociologists, who harp on the pitfalls that await small boys in big city slums but seldom mention the equally real peril that lies in the sparsely populated reaches of Midwest farm lands. That is, sheer boredom. The father of the farm boy may have been content to keep barely alive by slaving on the monotonous soil all his days. Well, the Old Man didn't know any better; he never got a glimpse of life as it really is, as revealed by the movies. But the Kid! He wants some fun out of this life.

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THE FABLE OF THE INDUSTRIOUS APPRENTICE.—Such a kid was John Dillinger. John's father, in the days before he became a vaudeville performer, worked from 4:30 in the morning till sundown on the sixty-acre Indiana farm, and he had a hard time making a living. "I like the land," his father told an interviewer. "My people been farmers for generations. But John, he hated farm work. Said it was too slow."

John's father, by the way, is a deacon in the Mooresville church, and John himself marched up to the altar to repent his sins in an old-time revival meeting. Here we have an example of the religious motif that runs with rather remarkable consistency through the careers of the new crop of American had men. Their murderous activities are not blamable on an atheistic environment, for at least they have had ample exposure to godliness. By and large they come from the most heavily religious belt of the nation.

Bonnie Parker (native of Texas) and Clyde Barrow (another Texan) worked together, over a period of years, at their business of robbing and killing. Last Spring they themselves were killed. Bonnie's last wish was that she should be buried beside Clyde. Accordingly, a double funeral was planned. But Mrs. Barrow put a stop to that. Her son may have humped of! a half dozen or so cops, hut she drew the line at allowing him to he buried beside a woman to whom he had not been united in holy wedlock.

A religious tinge also crept into the apprehension, a year ago, of the staunch American kidnapers of Charles F. Lrschel. Police went to the ranch of Mr. and Mrs. R. G. Shannon, local pillars of respectability in northern Texas, and found some of the §200,000 ransom money. While they were questioning the son, young Armon C. Shannon, his mother was in the next room praying loudly. The police let Armon go in to soothe his mother; hut she went right on praying except for a brief pause in which the police heard her say to Armon, "Keep your mouth shut, you Gdfool." Praying resumed.

In this Urschel case, there is a situation somewhat reminiscent of the Jukes tradition. The kidnaping was carried out practically by one family. The actual snatchers were "Machine Gun" George Kelly (really George F. Barnes, Jr., native of Memphis) and his wife, Kathryn Kelly, who is Mrs. Shannon's daughter by her first marriage. Kathryn's half-brother, Armon Shannon, helped guard the victim, who was held captive on the ranch of Kathryn's and Armon's mother, Mrs. R. G. Shannon. Most of the ransom money was found on the neighboring ranch of Kathryn's uncle, Cass Coleman, who later went to the penitentiary along with the rest of the family. Kathryn's grandmother was not implicated beyond the fact that her ranch was the gang's mailing address.

Furthermore, the family did not even possess the redeeming characteristic of loyalty. First, Brother Armon squealed on Mama Shannon. Then Kathryn offered to tell all she knew about Husband George Kelly if the cops would be considerate to her. And finally — crowning snitch — dear old Grandma, when wheeled into court, pointed out with a palsied hut willing forefinger such members of the gang as she was able to recognize.

Italians and Irish pioneered in organizing gangdom in a large -way in Chicago, and ruled there for some years. There was "Nize Johnny" Torrio from Italy, a music lover now in retirement on Long Island. There was Dion O'Bannion, from the ould sod, who was fond of orchids, and who kept his tailors harassed making his suits ultra-fashionable despite three gunpockets in each. There was Tony Genna, horn in Sicily, who had his toenails manicured before going to the hospital for an operation. And there was, of course, A1 Capone, who might tip a waiter a leaf (S100) for an evening's service.

But, enter an American hick in this exceedingly sophisticated environment. Enter the Touhy brothers, Roger, Cornelius, and Tommy, who shot their way to success in a highly specialized field hitherto almost monopolized by foreigners. Any movie fan could have told at once that Roger Touhy was no gangster: he cared nothing for night clubs, or for baby-blue Isotta-Fraschinis. He drove a dowdy Ford and ivore overalls! He came from Indiana with his brothers and his mob, and he settled down in Chicago's Northwest Side. Then lie actually muscled into the beer territory of A1 Capone's gang.

One day his mobsters sat for three hours in their dowdy Ford outside the powerful Teamsters' Union headquarters with machine guns trained to rub out Gang Leader Murray Humphries, Capone lieutenant, and get him out of that union racket. Humphries was fortunate enough not to show up, but he did get out of the Teamsters' Union and leave the field clear for the Touhys. Members of the Touhy gang, headed by Roger, were narrowly acquitted of having kidnaped William Hamm, Jr., for $100,000 ransom, and finally Roger and two pals were convicted of having kidnaped John ("Jake the Barber") Factor.

Nearly the whole gang were smalltown boys. Isaac Costner, horn in Tennessee, had a Southern drawl; Walter A. ("Buck") Hendrickson was a former Minnesota state cop. Albert Kator was born in Granite City, Ill. One was a foreigner: Ludwig ("Dutch") Schultz.

Far from undermining the American felonious tradition, the farm boys have built it up. Some nostalgic sentimentalists say the modern thugs, with their women partners and their practice of sneaking up behind cops to plug them in the hack, are puny fellows who would have been despised by outlaws of the old Southwest. Nonsense. Our present-day desperadoes operate more purposefully and make more money.

Beyond question, the New Bad Man with his armored car and his machine gun makes the James Boys and the Dalton gang look about as deadly as Mahatma Gandhi.