A Very OK Podcast
Episode 14: “Lawlessness and Law Enforcement in the 1920s and ’30s”
April 19, 2022
Episode Transcript
(upbeat music playing)
Trait Thompson: Hello, and welcome to A Very OK Podcast. My name is Trait Thompson. I’m the executive director of the Oklahoma Historical Society, and with me as always, is Dr. Bob Blackburn. Bob, it’s a great day. It’s a beautiful spring day in Oklahoma, and we get to talk about Oklahoma history, which is our favorite subject of things to talk about. And so, we have a pretty fascinating subject today. We’re going to talk about history of law enforcement in Oklahoma, and then get into that 1920s and ’30s eras with those gangsters and bank robbers and what’s going on during this time period. And later, I’m very excited because we are going to welcome and Leigh Dudley from the Federal—I want to make sure I get this right—the Federal Judicial Learning Center and Museum in downtown Oklahoma City, and she’s going to tell us a fascinating story about the kidnapping of Charles Urschel in 1933, I believe. And so, lots of good stuff to talk about. How have you been, Bob?
Dr. Bob Blackburn: Been doing well. Been busier than I should be in retirement. But I can’t help but get involved, and I’ve got to learn to say no because I’m still giving a lot of, I give, this coming Monday, two speeches in one day—one here in Oklahoma City, one in Weatherford. So I’m still giving a lot of speeches and working on some museum exhibits. Some books, of course, but enjoying being able to get up in the morning, read the newspapers, drink a little coffee, spend time with my wife. So it’s been a good year.
Thompson: I have to tell you, I just finished the manuscript for the book that I was working on on the Oklahoma State Capitol, and it was with Arcadia Publishing, which, if you’re familiar, you might see those in Walgreens or whatever. They’re the sepia-tone books with the photo captions in them. And I finished my manuscript and got it turned in after months of working on it. And I have to admit, when I started that process, I thought, oh, you know, writing a few photo captions, how hard could it be? It was really hard, and it was a lot of work. So, I was just thinking about you and all the books that you’ve written and all the work that you’ve done while you were trying to run this agency. And my respect level for you was already very high, but it went up even higher trying to balance all of that.
Blackburn: Well, thank you. Well, one reason I, you know, as an administrator, you’ll understand this, is that you may have ten minutes to focus on one thing, and then someone comes in the office, or you get a phone call, or you have to do something else. And so, really, we become more administrators of managing the resources. We’re still involved with history indirectly. But I always wanted to be a historian, and so the way to be a historian is that I’d volunteer for exhibits, or oral history project, or working with others. But writing the books was getting into the primary materials, coming up with a thesis, assembling the information, writing. And it just, I guess I became addicted to it. Published that first book, was in graduate school, and been writing. The next one will be number 28.
Thompson: Can you tell us what the subject of your next book is?
Blackburn: Well, it is a history of Twin Hills Country Club.
Thompson: Okay.
Blackburn: And it’s their centennial coming up in ’23. So I’ve completed most of the research. They had a fire last year, so they’re getting a new clubhouse. So that will be the final story in the book. But there’s an entire chapter on Arnold Palmer playing at Twin Hills a couple of times. There’s an entire chapter on, you know, early golf in Oklahoma. Perry Maxwell, who was the architect of the course, a chapter on him. So I’m having a good time with that one. And then also I’m, along with a couple of friends and colleagues, I’m editing Clara Luper’s autobiography, Behold the Walls. That is her story of the sit-ins, her life in Oklahoma, and I’ve finished the introduction to that. We’re doing the annotations now, but Karlos Hill is a main co-author at OU, and so that should be out from OU Press sometime next year.
Thompson: Well, and astute listeners and regular listeners to the podcast will remember that we did a podcast on the history of golf in the state of Oklahoma, and so many of the things that we talked about, you’ll be able to apparently read in Bob’s upcoming book. So that’s exciting. Do we know when it might be coming out?
Blackburn: I’m planning for it to be released this Christmas, so hopefully it’ll be done then. They’re going to wait for the big banquet until the new clubhouse is completed. But I want to make sure I don’t miss that deadline. So it should be by Christmas of ’22.
Thompson: Okay. We’re all going to look forward to that. Well, like I said, I’m really excited to talk about history of law enforcement in the state of Oklahoma and also those wild years of the ’20s and ’30s. But, you know, we always like to talk a little bit about movies, and of course, there are lots of different movies about law enforcement and cops and gangsters and all of those kinds of things. What’s your favorite? Do you have a few that you really like?
Blackburn: Well, of course. Bonnie and Clyde is probably one of the more artistic depictions of crime and lawmen in Oklahoma. Of course, that classic one with Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty in the 1970s is very stylized. If you go back and look at it now, you’re thinking, wow, that’s kind of odd. Well, in the ’70s, you know, movie makers are looking for something new. And then later The Highwaymen, that was kind of a remake of the Bonnie and Clyde story, a little different angle. More on the lawmen than the outlaws, but with Woody Harrelson and Kevin Costner as two retired Texas Rangers who were brought back onto the case, and it really reflects the problems with law enforcement at the time, that jurisdictions were fairly limited, and even the ability of lawmen to deal with snitches and to go undercover and all was being limited. And that’s really a good movie just to bring the story up on the perspective of lawmen and their ability to crack these cases.
Thompson: I have to agree with you. I watched The Highwaymen. I’ve seen it twice now. It’s on Netflix, and I really liked both Costner’s performance in that and Woody Harrelson’s performance in that as these kind of two old, washed-up Texas Rangers who, you know, Costner is kind of retired to his ranch and tooling around. And, you know, he gets this opportunity from the Governor of Texas, who’s played by Kathy Bates, and she is always incredible. But he gets this opportunity to go out and chase down Bonnie and Clyde. And, of course, at first, he turns it down and says no. And his wife says, what are you doing? You want to go do this. (laughter) And so and his old partner comes and joins him, and they kind of tool off across Texas, and Oklahoma, and Louisiana to go capture Bonnie and Clyde. And of course, you know, that ends in this big ambush scene that happens in Louisiana. But that’s a great movie and pretty easily accessible for those of you who have Netflix.
I have to say one of my favorites is The Untouchables, the movie that came out, I think, in ’88 with Kevin Costner and Sean Connery, and one of my favorite movie quotes is actually in that movie, and it’s the Sean Connery line. He says, “You want to know how to get Capone? They pull a knife. You pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital. You send one of his to the morgue.” I mean, just this great. I’m not even going to attempt a Sean Connery impression, but that’s one of my favorite lines in the whole movie, and it’s such a great, great movie about those days when it seemed like the gangsters had all of the advantage, and the lawmen were kind of continually trying to catch up, and they weren’t as sophisticated as the gangsters back in those days. But they were quickly catching up.
Blackburn: Yeah. You know, law enforcement, outlaws have always been a favorite theme in the movies, whether it’s John Wayne in True Grit or whatever. But a part of that is that outlaws and lawmen have built-in tension, and the heart of any art, whether it’s me writing a book or someone making a movie or a TV show. Dramatic tension is really the heartbeat of art like that. You have to have that. Even in visual art, you have to have the contrast. So it’s this dramatic tension, and of course, with the good guys and the bad guys, who’s going to win, who’s going to lose, you know, who’s going to be willing to take the risk to achieve something. That’s all dramatic tension. So it’s a natural for people wanting to make movies and television shows.
Of course, I grew up with Dragnet, the TV show, with Joe, you know, he said, “just the facts, ma’am. Just the facts.” Well, you know, law enforcement has been a natural. And you see it in all of the—me growing up in the ’50s and ’60s—almost every other TV show was a Western, and law enforcement was always a part of those shows.
Thompson: Gunsmoke—were you a fan of Gunsmoke?
Blackburn: Oh gosh, yes. I knew every one of those characters, and my friends and I would all go play the last episode around the neighborhood.
Thompson: It’s funny because when I go home, my stepdad, every evening after he’s home from working on the farm and the ranch and doing all his chores, he always comes and he lays on the couch, and he loves to watch old Westerns. And so he watches all these Gunsmoke episodes that I know we’ve seen 500 times apiece, but he still watches them over and over. And of course, I think they made that show for 25 years. So there’s a lot of episodes to go through there. One of my favorite movies, and I think it kind of the original buddy cop movie, was Lethal Weapon. And I point that out because one of Oklahoma’s own is the villain in that movie, and that’s Gary Busey, who does such a great job playing the villain in that particular film. But one of the great lines in that movie, and I won’t say the whole thing because it’s got a profanity in it, but Danny Glover’s line of, “I’m getting too old for this—you know what.” (laughter)
And, I also like to point out, you know, I love comedies, and Naked Gun is one of my favorite cop movies. And to this day, I have to admit it, but whenever I hear the national anthem, sometimes I’m tempted to sing the words that Leslie Nielsen sings as Enrico Palazzo when he’s on the baseball field in Naked Gun. (laughter)
Blackburn: As the umpire.
Thompson: Yes, so, I’m sorry to admit that, friends, but sometimes those words run through my head. I am human, after all. But there’s a lot of great movies that are associated with the law enforcement and the police genre. But, Bob, I know this is a particular area of expertise for you. I believe you did your dissertation over this, in fact. But let’s go back to those early years of Oklahoma law enforcement, and what’s the atmosphere like? And, you know, especially around that era of statehood, 1907, what does law enforcement look like in Oklahoma?
Blackburn: Well, law enforcement in Oklahoma has always been so interesting to me because there are so many overlapping jurisdictions and the timing of our settlement patterns. Law enforcement really was part of the Indigenous culture of even the nomadic Plains tribes. Anthropologists would call them “law-ways.” They’re not statutes. They’re not based on constitution. They’re not based on a lawman who’s paid as a designee. But among the Cheyenne, you’d have your societies. So the Dog Soldier Society, or the Lance Society, or the Bowstring Society, and they had certain functions as lawmen to make sure there was peace among all the different bands when they come together for the Sun Dance in the summertime. And so even among any group, you’re going to have some institution for public safety. How can we live together? And with all of human nature and problems, you have to have some kind of external way to enforce that. Well, the first constitutional law enforcement comes with the Five Civilized Tribes, who come to Oklahoma starting not long after the Louisiana Purchase. They bring constitutional government with lawman are first called Light Horsemen, and then the Light Horsemen are replaced by county sheriffs, just as it would have been in surrounding states at the time. And then, while you have this Indian law enforcement theme really evolving for almost 100 years, you have federal law because this is federal territory. And so, of course, the most famous law there would be Judge Isaac Parker at Fort Smith.
Thompson: The hanging judge.
Blackburn: The hanging judge and enforcing federal law west of Fort Smith in the Indian Territory. True Grit is probably the greatest movie there that depicts what was going on out of Fort Smith, and so you get these jurisdictional conflicts. You get this changing type of law enforcement. And as I wrote in my dissertation, law enforcement is changing with the times. So what is the newest threat to public safety?
Well, then government, whether it’s tribal or city, or state, or federal, comes up with new methods of fighting that. And as we come into the 20th century, we had a lethal weapon to outlaws, and that’s the automobile. By the teens, especially, and especially in the ’20s and ’30s, with high-speed cars, the V8 Ford motor gives people like Bonnie and Clyde this advantage of a crime, robbing a bank or hijacking, or whatever it might be, and then getting out of a local jurisdiction quickly.
And with Oklahoma, especially, and in most states, they wanted law enforcement. They wanted government to be local. So county commissioners were the most important agents of government in Oklahoma in 1907. County sheriffs, local law; no statewide law enforcement. You had the National Guard or militia that could be called out, you know, for intense threats to public safety. But generally, they wanted it local, and that’s the way people wanted it. But with the car, with mobility, with the changing times where people are moving into new frontiers all the time, where you don’t know everybody who might be walking down the street along with you, you get this new threat, and then throw on top of that the Great Depression, when people are really suffering, and people are turning to crime to really to survive. And then the general public being against the institutions that have built America, really questioning whether free enterprise works.
Thompson: Well, many of these. Yeah. That’s a great point because many of these outlaws actually became folk heroes to many of the poor and downtrodden. And during the Great Depression, they were seen as Robin Hoods or kind of taking on the man or the government. And, you know, you would think that the public would be afraid of these people because of some of the crimes that they’ve committed and some of the murders that they perpetrated. But it was quite the opposite, actually.
Blackburn: It really was. So you get that where people are doing that. Well, in Oklahoma, the response is that city and county law just could not handle it. And so in 1925, under the recommendation by then-Governor Martin Trapp, the governor no one’s ever heard of, because he was lieutenant governor, and when Jack Walton was impeached, he became governor for well over three years.
Thompson: Jack Walton was governor for about 15 minutes there in 1923.
Blackburn: Just about, and committed crimes. So he knew about the criminal element. But Trapp said we have to do something about it. And the state legislature created what we now call the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation in limited power. They could not go into a local jurisdiction without being invited, but they brought in the most recent crime-fighting methods of fingerprints and Bertillon records, and really understanding how to fight crime in this new society.
The best, even better example of that, in 1937, Governor Marland advocates, and the legislature responds during the Great Depression, when Bonnie and Clyde and “Pretty Boy” Floyd, “Machine Gun” Kelly are committing these crimes and getting away very quickly, they create the Department of Public Safety with the Highway Patrol as the heartbeat of that organization. Those first troopers are recruited in ’37. They hit the road. There’s a flying motorcycle element of the highway patrolman. They’re tough guys. My dad was one of the first troopers—how I kind of got interested in the history of law enforcement. And my dad said when Bud Gentry was interviewing those originally, he wanted big fighters. You had to be 5’11”, 180 pounds to be a trooper in those first days. And my dad had played football, an All-Star fullback, the Claremore Zebras, and he wanted the big guys. And the three questions were: Do you fight? My dad says “yes.” You like women? “Yes.” And do you drink? And my dad “well, yeah probably too much.” But that was typical of those lawmen. He wanted tough guys out there with the ability not just to take down an outlaw, but to move in those circles where people would be the snitches because the FBI would create this mythology.
And today, in television, with the CSI shows, it’s all based on forensics and science. Well, generally, you catch a bad guy because his buddy or a family member is willing to snitch. And so with Bonnie and Clyde, if you’ve seen, you know, The Highwaymen, they catch the highwaymen because, you know, a friend of the family says here’s where they’re going to be, and we’ll set him up, and they catch him. Well, that was typical. And so law enforcement’s evolving to deal with the threats to public safety, and it’s still evolving today. You still have issues around McGirt on who is going to prosecute criminals, and if they’re Indians or non-Indians, that becomes an issue again, as it was in the 19th century. And then you have other issues of dealing with cybercrime. You know, who has this jurisdiction if it’s someone committing a cybercrime on the internet? And so law enforcement will always change and evolve, just as criminals will change and evolve.
Thompson: You mentioned the cars and motor vehicles. Was law enforcement, did they keep up with the times in terms of becoming mechanized in Oklahoma? Were they still on horses for a while after cars came about, or did they keep up with how the outlaws were choosing to commit their crimes?
Blackburn: Well, generally, law enforcement is a reactive element. People do not want to give authority to anybody over their lives. You know, even today we say, oh, we don’t want to be tracked by Siri, and be careful about your iPad. You know, Americans generally, where you have this love of personal freedom and liberty. We resist giving away too much authority. So generally, it’s going to be only when the threat becomes serious that we’re saying, okay, we’re willing to give up some more of these liberties to someone who has authority over us as well as others. So generally, reactive. But there’s an interesting theme here.
A friend of mine, Dee Cordry, retired agent for the OSBI, has written a couple of books about law enforcement in Oklahoma. They’re both online, so look up Dee Cordry. And Dee came up with a thesis that there’s more in common between the horse-riding outlaws and the horse-riding lawmen of the 1880s and ’90s, with the outlaws and lawmen and cars in the early 20th century. So he sees a connection between the Daltons and Bonnie and Clyde. It’s just a little different methodology because they have new tools, but you’re still fighting it the same way. And really, other than statewide jurisdiction, which helped, the biggest tool lawmen had was the radio, and radios are still fairly rudimentary in the 1930s.
Fortunately, when I did my first book, The History of the Highway Patrol, that I wrote in 1976, the original technician who put together the Highway Patrol’s first radio system was still alive, so I got to interview him. And he said that he was getting spare parts, and sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t. Cloud cover might affect. And they would. It was only one-way. A trooper in a car could only get the one-way receiver. Had no way to transmit. And so someone might stop at a phone booth and call dispatch and say, “Tell somebody that there’s a ’34 Ford headed this direction into Lincoln County. Look for it.” And so then they would get on the transmitter and transmit it. Really, not until after World War II, when war helped advance communication, do you get two-way communication in a squad car.
Thompson: That’s fascinating. That feels like a million years ago. And in our age of when we can communicate with anybody across the world almost instantaneously, the fact that you could hear a message but then have to go find a phone and call somebody and then it be relayed that feels like, you know, the Stone Age or something.
Blackburn: That’s right. And of course, at the federal level, you have what would become the Federal Bureau of Investigation, working at the federal level. And again, most Oklahomans, as many Americans feel, we don’t want the centralized units of government getting too much power. So there was always resistance. J. Edgar Hoover, who helped create it and build that force, understood the power of propaganda. And so he encouraged movies like The FBI Story, where they would send in agents on the Osage murders with Jimmy Stewart. He understood that with these other movies on really letting the public know that, you know, we’re the G-men. We’re out there to protect them. And because it’s a matter of giving up some authority to a designee to go in with public safety. So what those Cheyennes on the High Plains in the 1750s faced, we’re facing that today. Who is going to help protect public safety? Who are the agents? How much authority are we going to give them? What are the powers that we’re going to give them to collect information?
I remember after the bombing of the Murrah Building, the FBI agents—I’ve sat on some committees on that museum and the collections—and the FBI agents say, hey, we are getting new powers because of this attack on public safety They said, we’ve got to keep those. Well, of course, the public tried to pull them back on surveillance, phone taps, and surveillance. And so you get into the Civil Liberties Union. And so you get this delicate balancing act that lawmen have to walk that fine line, and the powers, it comes back to rule of law. And then by the time you get down to the squad car and that officer, male and female now, on the street, dealing with the crime, dealing with having to make a decision on the spot, it’s a delicate line to walk. And it’s always been that way. Whether it was Bill Tilghman riding out of the Fort Smith courts, or it’s someone today on the beat in Oklahoma City or Tulsa.
Thompson: You know, in the 1920s and ’30s, it does seem to be that that was the era of the bank robber, and I think you’re right. You know, during that era, you could, you know, you could run into town in your new suped-up Ford, hit a bank, and be out of town before anybody really knew about it. And I think that the formation of DPS in 1937 is a reaction to the fact that, not only do we have this kind of these kind of things going on in the mid-1930s, but also, I think, as the proliferation of highways was happening across the state—actually we were one of the first states to to create the Highway Commission and to start building what we would consider modern highways. We also found out that we were pretty bad drivers, and we were not so good at it. (laughter)
And so I went on DPS’s website, and I pulled some stats here. So DPS was created in 1937. They have 125 troopers that go through that first-year academy. And they issued—get this—288,277 traffic warnings were issued in the first nine months of existence, but also 5,518 arrests were made during that first period. And so that shows you just—we were not used to being governed about how we were conducting ourselves on the highways at that particular point in time.
Blackburn: Well, and too, it’s a time when highways are built based on World War I standards. And so when Route 66 is first launched in 1926, is that you had narrow lanes, no shoulders, and the roads followed the terrain. So up and down, and around, and trying to get the right of way. So you had these zigs and zags, and then as cars got bigger and faster with more weight, you know, back when we wanted chrome on everything, well, that added weight, and then we wanted the more powerful engines. So you get the, you know, the 16-cylinder engines and all this horsepower. So people were going faster with more weight, less closing distance. And the carnage on the highways, people were dying left and right, and that was a threat to public safety. So if someone else is driving, and they cross that center lane and hit you. We’re saying no, we want someone to make sure someone doesn’t drive drunk. We don’t want them to drive too fast because it helps protect us. That’s when the public support really comes along for the Highway Patrol.
Thompson: Well, Bob, I think now would be a great time to transition into our story that Leigh is going to tell us about the Charles Urschel kidnapping. So, without further ado, let’s talk to Leigh.
Well, Bob, I’m really excited to welcome our guest into the podcast today. Today, we have Leigh Dudley, and she is the executive director of the Federal Judicial Learning Center and Museum, and she’s been in that position for the past four years. And one of the things that I got to do recently is to go down there to the Federal Courthouse and see their exhibit on the kidnapping of Charles Urschel. And I have to admit, this is a story that I think I’ve heard before but didn’t really know that much about, and they’ve put together a fantastic exhibit on that whole era of Oklahoma history, and then also talking about the trial of “Machine Gun” Kelly and the whole gang in that particular era of history. So I’m really excited for Leigh to be here, and we can’t wait to tell the story. So, Leigh, welcome into the podcast. It’s good to have you today.
Leigh Dudley: Thank you for having me. I’m excited to be here and excited to share a little bit on this story.
Thompson: So we have, we’ve been talking about this era in Oklahoma history, some of the lawlessness and some of the law enforcement that’s going on. So, maybe let’s just set the scene. What is going on in this time period? And so we’ve got a few friends that had gathered together on a warm summer night. What’s going on in Oklahoma City that leads to the kidnapping?
Dudley: While it was a hot summer night in July 1933, and the Urschel family, Charles Urschel and his wife Berenice, and some of their close friends, the Jarretts, were sitting on the sun porch in Heritage Hills on 18th Street, playing cards, the fan buzzing overhead, and just enjoying a quiet evening at home. And two men enter the sun porch, both armed, one with a pistol and one with a submachine gun, a Thompson submachine gun. So, we have “Machine Gun” Kelly and his buddy Albert Bates, who tell them to stick their hands up. Nobody move, or they’re going to blow their heads off. So they then start asking for Charles Urschel, asking which of the men were him, and neither fessed up. So both men stood up and went with these two outlaws, if you want to call them that, which is what they were, put them in the back of a dark sedan, and headed out of town.
Thompson: So I have to ask. This seems like it was something that was premeditated, that they knew. How did they know they would be home? Do we know if they cased the place first? Or they didn’t even, I guess, have a picture of Charles Urschel because they didn’t really know what he looked like. They must have known him by reputation as being just a wealthy man. I’m curious about that.
Dudley: He had earned a reputation of being a wealthy, he’s a wealthy oilman, and was in the papers often, and it was discovered, whether they cased the house, obviously, they had some henchmen out and about that discovered where he lived.
Thompson: Okay, okay.
Blackburn: Trait, if I might add to here a little bit, is that at this time, kidnappings were very common across the country. This was not just an Oklahoma story. It was happening across, you know, coast to coast. And this was during the Great Depression. A lot of people were desperate. There was a different attitude about outlaws at the time. Some of the outlaws became kind of famous, became celebrities, and in this particular case, the Urschels were probably a little bit lax in their home security. There were other families in the neighborhood who were very aware of kidnappings. The Gaylord family, for example, were very concerned about kidnappings, and the three children in the Gaylord home were protected. They, you know, certain people would drive them to schools and other places. And so, the community was very aware of the potential threat at the time. But Urschel was kind of one of those greatest gamblers, risk-takers that you find in the oil industry. He had been the attorney for Tom Slick.
Thompson: Okay.
Blackburn: The famous oilman who discovered the oil fields in Cushing. And so, you know, they were risk-takers and gamblers and not afraid to get up on a rig, not afraid to invest everything they had in the next well. So that leads a little bit into this risk-taking and probably a little lax security around the Urschel home.
Thompson: Probably a little hubris to think that anybody who would try something, they would take them on. So we have, and it’s late at night. It’s like 11 o’clock at night, and of course it’s hot. So they’re sitting outside, and they get kidnapped, and what happens from there, Leigh?
Dudley: So, the men are taken off about 10 miles outside of town. They discover that Mr. Jarrett, Walter Jarrett, is not the man they were looking for. So they boot him out of the back of the car. They give him some of his own money for a cab, tell him, of course, not to call in the law enforcement, not to tell anybody. And they pocketed the rest of his cash, and they headed to Texas with Charles Urschel. During that time, the women at home, Mrs. Urschel, Berenice Urschel, gets on the phone and calls the local law enforcement and finds herself, within a short amount of time, on the phone with J. Edgar Hoover and the Bureau of Investigation.
So that begins all of the activity in Oklahoma City, as far as bringing in local law enforcement, officials, FBI, which it wasn’t the FBI yet. So it was the Bureau of Investigation until 1935. So it wasn’t referred to as the FBI quite yet. So all of that action starts in Oklahoma City while the men make their way to northwest Texas; Paradise, Texas, to the Shannon Farm, which is where Urschel was held for a total of nine days.
Thompson: I think this is a good spot to talk a little bit about “Machine Gun” Kelly, since, you know, he’s central to this piece of the puzzle. He was born George Kelly Barnes, and he was named “Machine Gun” because of the submachine gun that his wife purchased him, which, you know, I gotta say, I’ve been married for, you know, quite a few years, and my wife has never purchased me a submachine gun. So I feel a little bit like, you know, like, you know, I feel a little bit left out.
Blackburn: But you need to do better in your marriage, Trait, to get that machine gun. I have two or three. Yeah, overachieved. (laughter)
Thompson: Well, you know, we’re going to have to work on that. Sara and I are going to have a talk later about the kind of gifts we’re exchanging in our marriage. But yes, his wife gives him a submachine gun. He’s a bootlegger and a bank robber before the kidnapping happens. And he’s kind of a low-level criminal for a while until he breaks in, like you said, kidnapping was kind of becoming the crime du jour of the mid 1930s because there were, the Barker gang was one who actually got some really good payoffs doing some of the kidnapping and kidnappings in the mid-1930s. So I suppose that kind of filtered around throughout the gangs.
Dudley: Mm-hmm. He also met Kathryn Kelly, who was already into other groups, local gangsters, and all sorts of criminal activity, leading up to her meeting “Machine Gun” Kelly. So I do believe, as many others believe, she was a significant influence, not a positive one necessarily, in his life. For example, buying the machine gun, the Tommy gun, at a pawn shop in Texas.
Thompson: Yeah.
Dudley: And then she would go around to the local speakeasies because it’s also prohibition era, right? Go around to local speakeasies and really talk up her man. Right? So she would take in empty cartridges and say, oh, yeah, this, you know, my guy, this big buy can pop a walnut at 30 feet, you know, way off the top of a fence. So she really played him up and boosted his career, his criminal career.
Thompson: Yeah. Once again, things my wife has never said about me. (laughter)
Thompson: So we get to the farm in Paradise, Texas. Now, where is Paradise?
Dudley: It’s northwest Texas, kind of out in the middle of nowhere. They’ve got a great historical society, and they do a nice telling of the story themselves. So a shout-out to the Paradise, Texas, historical society. But yes, we have this really pretty meager ranch of about a little over 500 acres. There was a main house. It was owned by “Boss” Shannon, was the name that he went by. There’s a lot of great nicknames, too, when you get into these, you know, criminal families.
Thompson: They did have good nicknames back then, you know, “Pretty Boy“ Floyd, “Machine Gun” Kelly. They were good at the nickname game.
Dudley: They were. They definitely were. So, “Boss” Shannon, it was his ranch. He was married to Kathryn Kelly’s mother, Ora Shannon. He’d been married before, as had Ora Shannon. And they had, it was a local hideout. It was known to be a criminal hideout, really. It was out in this remote part of Texas, and so different gangsters or criminals coming through knew they could hide out there. They would be protected there. So, also living on this ranch was his son, “Boss” Shannon’s son. His nickname was “Potatoes.” So “Potatoes” Shannon, his name was Orman Shannon. He had, with his young wife and a baby, lived on the ranch as well in this little shack behind the main house, which is where Urschel was held.
Thompson: Now, Urschel was blindfolded this whole time. Can you tell us a little bit about the details of how he was kept in captivity? Was he beaten up? Was he treated okay? Were they just kind of holding on and waiting for the ransom?
Dudley: He was treated pretty well, actually, and retold the story and his account of being held there as treated fairly well. He was blindfolded the entire time. He wasn’t in a comfortable situation. Of course, it’s the 1930s. It was very common for rural parts of the country to not have running water or electricity. So that lacked for sure in this shack on this ranch. He was chained, day and night, to a chair, sometimes to a small high chair that was by a bed, which he was eventually moved to. But for most of the time, he was on the floor on a mattress, chained to something.
Thompson: And he, in reading the account of this, one of the things I was amazed at, he must have had a really good memory because he memorized a lot of the details of his surroundings, which ultimately ended up helping to catch the culprits.
Dudley: It absolutely did. He paid very close attention, and he did really take it all into memory. Sight; smells, not sights. He couldn’t see anything. However, he was allowed to shave towards the end of his captivity, and he kind of got a little glimpse of the room where he was being held, but he listened. He took in the sounds of the farm animals. One of the most notable things that he took into account was the flight of a commercial airplane that would make a pass over the ranch at the same time every day, except for towards the end of his captivity, after many days of dry weather, there was torrential wind and rain, and the airplane didn’t make its flight. So he noted all of that, and that was key to helping the authorities find where he was and those connected to the crime.
Thompson: That’s fascinating to me. That really is, and that is a key part of it. So all the while this is going on, there’s a $200,000 ransom that’s being demanded of the family. And looking back over it, the FBI, they didn’t do this giant manhunt during the time when he was being held captive because they wanted, they didn’t want him to get killed. And so they kind of, and I know you said it’s not the FBI, so I’ll try and correct that as we move on, but they kind of held themselves back because they wanted to see how the ransom thing would play out and so that he wouldn’t end up getting killed as a result of them, you know, hustling under bushes and turning over things, and trying to to really find him.
Dudley: Absolutely. And there were so many false claims to the kidnapping, which I think is particularly fascinating. And it’s amazing to read about how they did conduct this investigation. Berenice Urschel at home, surrounded by her family, and initially, a lot of local law enforcement, the newspaper, you know, the press just gathered around the Urschel home for days until eventually they did become very concerned about that, eventually causing harm to Charles Urschel, and so they were all asked to leave. But they were fielding calls and false claims of kidnappings demanding $1,000, $10,000, and they even, Berenice Urschel, with a family friend, Arthur Celixson, even sought after one such demand and went and met with an individual. Berenice had a gun held to her, in front of her face, and they were brave enough to pass off only a portion of money to these people claiming to have kidnapped Urschel, and of course, discovered it was false. And so it does change the nature of the investigation as things like this happen. So I think that’s particularly fascinating.
Thompson: This story is just wild to me, Bob. And I just kind of wonder, has anybody? This should be a movie, right? I mean, this would be a fascinating movie. Has this been made into a movie before?
Blackburn: I’m not aware of that. Leigh, do you know?
Dudley: No.
Blackburn: I don’t think so either.
Thompson: Okay, well, all of our new Hollywood folks who are now coming to Oklahoma and making movies, we think this would be a great movie at some point to make about this unique aspect of Oklahoma history. Okay, now let’s get into the whole ransom part, because this is a whole fascinating endeavor in and of itself, that involves secret ads in the Daily Oklahoman and clandestine meetings in hotels and faraway cities. So let’s dive into that part of the story.
Dudley: Let’s have fun. Every part of the story is so much fun. This one, yes! I mean, it is like a movie. You would see this undercover. Friends were sent a letter, so the kidnappers ask Charles Urschel to pen a few letters. He writes one to his friend Mr. Catlett that’s sent to him in Tulsa, along with two other letters; one written by Charles Urschel to his wife Berenice to be given to her, and then another letter to another close friend of the Urschels, and that is E. E. Kirkpatrick. And so they’re given orders basically of $200,000 is the ransom. Do not speak to local law enforcement. And this was the highest ransom demand up to that point in history. It was a huge amount, sum of money. And so immediately, Catlett, who’s in Tulsa, he's actually shaving. I love this story. I love all the little details, I just can’t help myself.
Thompson: That’s what makes the story. (laughter)
Dudley: So he’s getting ready, you know, one morning shaving and receives a telegram, Western Union, with these letters inside. Of course, reads, and he knows of the situation. It’s a close friend. He knows that Urschel has been kidnapped. But here, he has this letter with a demand in front of him. So I think it’s five, ten minutes. He’s out the door, and he is heading to Oklahoma City, delivers the letter to E. E. Kirkpatrick, and they go from there. So, the orders are in this letter to place a blind ad in the Daily Oklahoman, that is a farm for sale, right? With a box number to be assigned. That will be the sign to the kidnappers that they’re in the game, that they’re going to work with them and start working on meeting the ransom.
Thompson: Okay. So that was just basically the entry fee. We see this ad in the Daily Oklahoman, which, by the way, I’ve done quite a bit of research in the old news archives right now. And back in those days, the want ads were, there was tons of them, and they were all little print, not hardly any pictures. And so you would have had to really scour through, and this ad that they had designed about a farm for sale would have probably blended in with 100 other ads just like it.
Dudley: It was just to look for the very specific dimensions of the farm, the cow included, you know, those small details that would show that that was the one, those exact words asked for by the kidnappers.
Thompson: Okay, so where do we go from there? The kidnappers see the ad. What happens next?
Dudley: So then they communicate one more time. They basically say we are not going to communicate any further. We don’t have the time. We don’t have the patience. Do this, or, and of course, a threat comes with that communication. You will never see Urschel again. I mean, it was pretty graphic, pretty brutal, the threats that they made. Many were made throughout the kidnapping, the ransom demand, and then the trial, as well. And so the orders are given to Kirkpatrick to travel alone to Kansas City, Missouri, to board a train, and to watch for a fire on the side of the tracks, the right side of the tracks. For the first one, you’ll know that the kidnappers are going to meet for the ransom exchange. The second fire lit on the side of the railroad track will be the key to toss the bag, and Urschel was intended to be there to collect to retrieve the suitcase with the $200,000 in it, and then they would go from there.
Thompson: And there was a dummy bag, right?
Dudley: There was a dummy bag. Yes, there was, with paper. So in case these, and Kirkpatrick was supposed to go alone but did not. He took Catlett with him, and so they were very nervous. You can only imagine they were already defying the kidnappers’ demand by bringing along an additional person. Of course, they weren’t to be armed. They were supposed to sit at the very back of the last passenger car, which there are all these interesting things that happened along the way. They actually added, I can’t remember exactly what reason, but they added two Pullman cars to the end of the train, which was not intended. So the two gentlemen, again, were very nervous about that, you know, giving a bad sign to the kidnappers, anything that would threaten Urschel’s life. So they set up two camp stools on the back of the last train car, and they basically just sat up all night.
Every time they got a little close to a town coming up, Catlett would go inside and sit inside the train, and Kirkpatrick would just stand, smoke a cigarette, and keep an eye out. They’d go through a town. They’d return to their camp stools until the next one. Well, what happened is they never saw the signal off to the right side of the railroad tracks, which is what they were supposed to watch for, and they waited for the entire trip to Kansas City, which, by the way, just months before this, we had the Kansas City massacre happened. So already the city itself, and Missouri, was just this hotbed of activity, and really already the nation keeping an eye on things going on with all of these different crimes, bank robberies, and kidnappings happening. It was already just set up for a lot of intensity, right?
Thompson: Right.
Dudley: So they arrive in Kansas City, never seeing the signal they were supposed to wait for. They wonder, Kirkpatrick is wondering...
Thompson: Do we know if the signal was given, or if it just something went wrong?
Dudley: Something went wrong, and so they weren’t able to go and light the fire. And so they were communicating. Once they arrive in Kansas City, they had eyes on them all the time, which is eerie to think about. I mean, because obviously in the 1930s, it’s somebody on foot following you, or on the train car at the hotel, or at the train station when you arrive in Kansas City.
And but they’re these two gentlemen, Catlett and Kirkpatrick don’t know why they haven’t seen the signal at this point. Did they mess up? Do they know? Does Kirkpatrick, you know, he had Catlett come along, so is Urschel done for? So that the intensity that they were, you know, what they were feeling, I can’t imagine how intense that would have been. Not to mention Berenice Urschel at home waiting for word every little step of the way as well.
So they arrive at this hotel. They check into a hotel, and they do receive word from someone, one of the kidnappers, saying sorry, wasn’t able to meet you last night, which was basically saying we weren’t able to do what we’re supposed to do. Meet us at the LaSalle Hotel with the money, I think it was 6:30 p.m. So, they wait all day, and I love, Trait, I showed you this book. E. E. Kirkpatrick wrote a book shortly after the kidnapping that is, it’s just wonderful, you know, sort of melodramatic of-the-era piece, but it’s a firsthand account for the most part, very shortly after all of this went down, and he describes the hotel and waiting in the hotel for the length of the day, how long that was. He talks about the piano pieces being played downstairs while they wait. And so you have all of these little details that really paint this picture.
Thompson: It puts you in the moment.
Dudley: Yes, it’s so fantastic.
Thompson: You know, I like to think, and today, I think we’re a little desensitized because we’ve seen 100 kidnapping movies and, you know, pop culture and film has kind of desensitized us a little bit, I think. But think about putting yourself in that situation, and you have this job to do, and it’s your friend, and you don’t know, is he alive? Is he dead? Am I doing something wrong? I mean, it must have been harrowing. I mean, it must have just been on the edge of your seat.
Dudley: Yes, I think so. Definitely. And then to make, then the clock strikes time, right? And it’s time to go to the LaSalle with $200,000 in a briefcase to be carried in his right hand. And so he walks, and he has a hat on, of course, well-dressed, and stops, puts the case down, lights a cigarette. He peers underneath the brim of his hat to check out the street ahead of him, and he sees a man, a very tall man, well-dressed man, coming towards him. And it’s very obvious to him that it’s the person there to make the exchange.
Thompson: And do they make the exchange in person?
Dudley: They do.
Thompson: Okay.
Dudley: And E. E. Kirkpatrick was armed. He had a pistol in his belt. He was not supposed to be armed. So again, he was already on edge, but there was no way he was going to walk into that situation without being armed. And, but it was a pretty short and sweet exchange. Here it is. He did ask for confirmation that Urschel was alive. He was not given that. He was just told that he would meet the same gentleman 20 to 30 minutes in the lobby of the hotel where he was staying, but was promised that Urschel should be returned to his family within 12 hours. So that’s the promise that was made at that time.
Thompson: Now, the money, they had recorded all the serial numbers, correct?
Dudley: So, yes, they did their best, and they were told not to mess with that. But of course they did. And at the Learning Center, at the Judicial Learning Center, we have scrapbooks from the Urschel family that have all of the serial numbers from the cash. It is unbelievable. I can’t imagine who ever was charged with the duty of having to take down all of those serial numbers. It’s astounding.
Thompson: Because it’s all in $20 bills.
Dudley: Twenty-dollar bills; $200,000 in $20 bills.
Thompson: Fascinating, fascinating. Okay, so the exchange happens. What happens next to Urschel?
Dudley: So, Urschel has been told that the ransom was made, the exchange was made. And in this note that he wrote to Berenice, he didn’t know. Charles Urschel never knew, I think it was maybe a week to two weeks after he was returned to his family in Oklahoma City, that he even discovered how much his life had been bartered for. He had no clue when he was being held captive, and he wrote this note to his wife, saying if the ransom demand is too great, don’t worry about it. I’m okay with it. And it’s, just, I don’t know, it’s heartwarming, I guess? I don’t know if that’s the right word, but he didn’t know if it would... He was concerned about the Urschel estate, the Slick estate. He wanted to preserve that, and he was concerned about his family more so than himself. He was thinking of other things. And so I don’t, I just think that’s really something, shows a lot about his character.
Thompson: Yeah. I guess he didn’t want to bankrupt his wife, and you know, his kids, or whoever else that would be subject to inheriting his wealth later on down the line.
Dudley: That’s another moment, where you have no idea what’s going through his mind in a situation like that. So he’s been told that the ransom has gone down, has been paid and received, and that he’s going to be returned to his family. So they let him clean up a little bit. He has an excellent meal prepared by Ora Shannon, and he’s making the ready to return home. He was not returned within 12 hours. It took longer than anticipated, which caused a lot of anxiety among everyone involved: those at home waiting for him, the kidnappers involved. You have to try to imagine how people communicate in the 1930s, and this kidnapping, the criminal ring that it involved, went beyond six states. I mean, it really was far-reaching.
Thompson: Yeah, ultimately, 21 people ended up being convicted as being, as somehow related to this one crime.
Dudley: Yes, you have money that was sent to various places across the country. There was a money-laundering ring in Minneapolis in Minnesota. Many of those individuals were charged, tried, and convicted. And so there was a lot of communication going on. Some of it didn’t land as it was supposed to, and so it took a little more time to get Urschel home. But he was blindfolded and taken back to, close to Oklahoma City. He was dropped off in Norman outside of a barbecue stand. Raining, it was raining hard, and he actually went in to this barbecue joint and got a cup of coffee before he did anything else. And I, people, you can read and research different things, and people can question that or wondered why he didn’t immediately, I think he just needed to steady himself before, just the enormity of the situation and realizing that his life has been spared, and he’s going to return to his family and what that’s going to look like.
Thompson: Okay, so how do we, how does the Bureau of Investigation start tracking down these folks? And ultimately, how do they get “Machine Gun” Kelly?
Dudley: So, yes, they are now ready to determine where Urschel was held, who was involved, all of these moving pieces, moving parts. Local law enforcement, a number of of course, Texas law enforcement officials were heavily involved in this. And so they’re sent out based on, they take an account from Urschel, which is, again, like we’ve talked about, was the key piece to really finding where he had been held. And so it’s putting those things together, drawing out, there’s some excellent, you know, sketches of what the farm looked like based on how he moved about within this farm, on this ranch. And so they start scouting out different ranches in Texas and get closer and closer to Paradise. And really, through luck and communicating with local farmers and local people, that, oh yeah, the Shannon Ranch is kind of known, you know, to be a hideout. He was a well-known, “Boss” Shannon was a well-known figure. He was kind of, he was involved in local politics. He was into a lot of different things. So there are different key pieces that helped law enforcement officials just get closer and closer.
Thompson: And that plane that didn’t fly over that one day, they were able to find out that it went out of the way to avoid the storm, and that helped them a lot in determining the location.
Dudley: Absolutely. That’s so fascinating. I love it.
Thompson: Good old-fashioned detective and sleuth work.
Dudley: That’s right. Sleuthing, I love it. So they determine that they have found the ranch. And so then, once they are feeling very confident that they’ve found their guy or their entire crew, really, then they get in cars and they go to the ranch. And Charles Urschel was with them, which also, it blows my mind every time I read the story or think about it. You have the Bureau of Investigation, you have Texas lawmen, you have Charles Urschel armed with a double-barreled shotgun in the back of a car, to confront and confirm these criminals. And they find them, and they find an extra. They get a bonus criminal as well. So first they, when they descend upon this ranch, they find sleeping on a cot on the front porch, Harvey Bailey, who was a well-known bank robber, criminal. Law enforcement had been after him for a long, long time. He was considered to be part of the kidnapping, initially. He was not. He was hiding out. So they found him, and that was a big win for the Bureau of Investigation. They find the Shannons there. They find the Tommy gun that “Machine Gun” Kelly used in the kidnapping. So they’re loaded up in a car, and they’re brought to the city to await trial.
Thompson: Now, they didn’t find at first, they didn’t find “Machine Gun” Kelly, but then they start the trial process of the people that they did have, and the judge was Judge Edgar S. Vaught, correct?
Dudley: Yes. Judge Vaught, one of my, we have so many fantastic judges. The judicial history of the Western District is fantastic and fascinating, and Judge Vaught is one of my favorites for sure. A wonderful man, wonderful judge, and a lot of attention on this case for sure. So they don’t find, they do start the process, getting ready for trial, but they are absolutely determined and hard-pressed to find “Machine Gun” Kelly and Kathryn Kelly, and that’s another piece of the story that is very fascinating. They were able to elude the law for over 50 days and were found in Memphis, which was “Machine Gun” Kelly’s hometown.
Thompson: September 26, 1933; I thought this was an interesting tidbit. Apparently, Kelly shouted, “Don’t shoot, G-men!” And that was the first time that in popular use, the word “G-men,” and that came to define the FBI later.
Dudley: Absolutely.
Blackburn: It stood for government men, is what he was alluding to.
Dudley: Yes. And if you look back through, oh, there’s fantastic true-crime magazines from this era that are really fun to look through. And that is what you see on all of these, you know, kind of dime novels and old publications are G-men. I mean, that really did establish a certain persona for what will become the FBI a few years later. And there’s also rumor that he never said that, that it was—
Blackburn: The FBI...
Dudley: Maybe, you know, added to the story a little bit to make it a little more exciting that he was more demure than that, maybe, “Machine Gun” Kelly, when he was caught. (laughter)
Thompson: Okay, so they go to trial, and then they’re convicted. “Machine Gun” Kelly ends up dying in prison in 1954. Bates dies in prison in 1948. And his wife and the Shannons were released from prison in 1958. And so, one of the other interesting things, Bob, is there is video footage of this trial, correct?
Blackburn: Right. Judge Vaught was a community leader. He was also on the Board of Directors of the Oklahoma Historical Society.
Thompson: Okay.
Blackburn: Which is a pretty cool connection with how we’re going to end this conversation today. But Judge Vaught allowed reporters into the courtroom, which is very unusual at the time. And in fact, it’s not allowed now. But the Vaught said this is such a high profile case. He allowed cameraman in, and one of those cameramen was taking 16-millimeter footage of the trial itself, and no one knew at the time what happened to it. But years later, Judge Ralph Thompson, one of my personal heroes, and a real reform judge here in the state, respected around the world, very well-known. And as Leigh said, we’ve had so many great judges. But Judge Thompson is another one of those. He found that roll the film. And I remember when he found it, because his wife, Barbara, was on our Board of Directors at the time.
Thompson: And still is.
Blackburn: And still is, and I knew Ralph, of course. And he was very proud of the fact that he found this. It was on nitrate, had it transferred to safety film. And so we actually have the film from that trial where Judge Vaught is up there on the bench that’s raised. The courtroom is still there. And Leigh can talk about that if people want to take a tour of the Education Center. But that really started this renaissance in the story of “Machine Gun” Kelly, and this entire episode of history, but with the film footage. Then OETA did a little feature on that, and it’s become part of our story now in Oklahoma.
Dudley: It’s fantastic footage. It’s great.
Thompson: So, Leigh, as we wrap up here, one of the things that we’re proud of at the Historical Society is that we have our Heritage Grant Program, and through this grant program that we, thankfully, get appropriated from our legislature every year, we are able to provide grants to historical organizations all over the state to help preserve history, to do exhibits, to do strategic planning. And those grants can range anywhere from $1,000 or $2,000 all the way up to $20,000. And we gave you all a grant, and you were able to put together this fantastic exhibit. So you might talk just a little bit about the exhibit and how people can come and find you and tour that.
Dudley: Absolutely. We are so thankful for that Heritage Grant that has been given to us in the past. And we received another one to do another amazing exhibit that we’ll be doing, the Hale and Ramsey trial pertaining to the Osage murders in the 1920s. That’s another exciting case, a trial that occurred at in the Western District Court. And we were able; that grant is the only way we were really able to do this story, an exhibit on the Urschel kidnapping, and so we are so grateful for that. And it is a wonderful exhibit, and I would love to show anyone who’d like to stop by the Judicial Learning Center, learn more about this story. There are amazing photographs that the Historical Society has, and that we have utilized. There’s the film footage that was mentioned. The historic courtroom where the trial took place is stunning.
Thompson: I got to see it, and I love it. As an old-building geek, I really did enjoy that.
Dudley: It’s beautiful, and it is history. We could spend hours talking about the architecture and the history of the building itself. So we are open 9 to 5, Monday through Friday, and I’m there, and we have wonderful people and a wonderful space. So come on by, and see it, and visit.
Thompson: What’s your address?
Dudley: Our address is 215 Dean A. McGee. We are located in the historic old post office building.
Thompson: And that’s here in Oklahoma City for our far-flung listeners.
Blackburn: Trait, if I might add one more shout-out. Of course, Judge Thompson deserves that. He’s always been history-minded. In fact, there’s a great book about his life and career that I would recommend people read about Judge Thompson, but Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange was appointed to the court years ago, and Vicki really took an interest in this.
In fact, we’re working with the family now on Vicki’s collections that will come to the History Center. But Vicki really took an interest in this whole idea. And I’ll never forget, when I was executive director, Vicki came with some friends from the private sector and said they wanted to create a historical society for the Western District Courts. And after a couple of years of really working on this, we came up with an agreement. There’s a contract, is that the Oklahoma Historical Society is a repository for all the collections and the oral histories, and then the private sector has a 501(c)(3) funding mechanism, and then the judges all got involved. We did a lot of oral histories in those early days. Once a month, I would see all the judges here in town. Of course, you always give judges a lot of respect, and so I always make sure I would come out and and greet the judges. And Judge Thompson was always there at the time. But without Vicki Miles-LaGrange’s determination to make this work, it would have fallen apart. I went to a few meetings where, of course, judges all think they know what should be done. That’s just, you know, human nature. But Vicki kept it on track, and she would say, oh, this person wants to do this, this, that. But Vicki kept pulling it back to the core mission: collections, exhibits, education. And Vicki had some health issues, but I have nothing but respect for Vicki Miles-LaGrange, and Vicki hired Leigh to come in and take over the project. And Leigh earned Vicki’s respect, and she’s carrying on with judges now. Judge DeGiusti is now, I think, president, Leigh, of your historical society?
Dudley: Board chair, yes.
Blackburn: Board chair, and you still have your 501(c)(3) side with Ed.
Dudley: Yes.
Blackburn: And helping with that. So it’s been a great partnership with the Historical Society and the judges, and making sure that we preserve our history.
Thompson: Well, and Bob, I know the Heritage Grant Program was an idea that you came up with, and it’s one of the, in my opinion, is one of the best things that we do, because obviously, as the Historical Society, we can’t be everywhere and doing everything. But this is a way that we can continue to help. And so, I love that we have an opportunity to do that. And Leigh, thank you for coming on and telling us such a fascinating story today. And I think a lot of people are going to be surprised about all of the details, and the twists, and the turns in this case and story. So thank you.
Dudley: Thank you so much. A lot of fun, thank you.
Thompson: Bob, that was a fascinating story, and Leigh did such a good job of telling all the twists and the turns in that kidnapping story. And I want to go read more about it now, but what a fascinating tale.
Blackburn: It is, and Leigh is a great storyteller. I was very impressed with her knowledge. And people need to give their support to Leigh and the Western District Historical Society. And the reason she could tell that story is that the film of the trial had been preserved, which to me is an amazing story. Judge Vaught wrote his memories. Others wrote their story. You can still drive in Heritage Hills and see the see the home there at 18th and Hudson where the kidnapping occurred. And so it’s still a relevant story today. And I’m glad that Leigh and her board, thank you and your staff for giving them the grant to do that exhibit. And I look forward to working with Leigh more in the future.
Thompson: As do I. Well, Bob, it’s been great talking to you as always, and we’ll look forward to talking on our next podcast episode.
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You’ve been listening to A Very OK Podcast hosted by Trait Thompson and Dr. Bob Blackburn. The podcast is produced by the Oklahoma Historical Society. Visit us at okhistory.org, and find us on social media by searching for @okhistory. I encourage you to purchase a membership to OHS to help us continue our mission to collect, preserve, and share Oklahoma’s unique and fascinating history.
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