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N0KFQ > TODAY 22.10.14 16:07l 58 Lines 2615 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 38537_N0KFQ
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Subj: Today in History - Oct 22
Path: IW8PGT<IZ3LSV<I0OJJ<VE3UIL<N9PMO<N3XPD<KQ0I<N0KFQ
Sent: 141022/1455Z 38537@N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA BPQK1.4.60
Oct 22, 1934:
Pretty Boy Floyd is killed by the FBI
Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd is shot by FBI agents in a cornfield
in East Liverpool, Ohio. Floyd, who had been a hotly pursued
fugitive for four years, used his last breath to deny his
involvement in the infamous Kansas City Massacre, in which four
officers were shot to death at a train station. He died shortly
thereafter.
Charles Floyd grew up in a small town in Oklahoma. When it became
impossible to operate a small farm in the drought conditions of
the late 1920s, Floyd tried his hand at bank robbery. He soon
found himself in a Missouri prison for robbing a St. Louis
payroll delivery. After being paroled in 1929, he learned that
Jim Mills had shot his father to death. Since Mills, who had been
acquitted of the charges, was never heard from or seen again,
Floyd was believed to have killed him.
Moving on to Kansas City, Floyd got mixed up with the city's
burgeoning criminal community. A local prostitute gave Floyd the
nickname "Pretty Boy," which he hated. Along with a couple of
friends he had met in prison, he robbed several banks in Missouri
and Ohio, but was eventually caught in Ohio and sentenced to
12-15 years. On the way to prison, Floyd kicked out a window and
jumped from the speeding train. He made it to Toledo, where he
hooked up with Bill "The Killer" Miller.
The two went on a crime spree across several states until Miller
was killed in a spectacular firefight in Bowling Green, Ohio, in
1931. Once he was back in Kansas City, Floyd killed a federal
agent during a raid and became a nationally known criminal
figure. This time he escaped to the backwoods of Oklahoma. The
locals there, reeling from the Depression, were not about to turn
in an Oklahoma native for robbing banks. Floyd became a Robin
Hood-type figure, staying one step ahead of the law. Even the
Joads, characters in John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, spoke
well of Floyd.
However, not everyone was so enamored with "Pretty Boy."
Oklahoma's governor put out a $6,000 bounty on his head. On June
17, 1933, when law enforcement officials were ambushed by a
machine-gun attack in a Kansas City train station while
transporting criminal Frank Nash to prison, Floyd's notoriety
grew even more. Although it was not clear whether or not Floyd
was responsible, both the FBI and the nation's press pegged the
crime on him nevertheless. Subsequently, pressure was stepped up
to capture the illustrious fugitive, and the FBI finally got
their man in October 1934.
73, K.O. n0kfq
N0KFQ @ N0KFQ.#SWMO.MO.USA.NA
E-mail: kohiggs@gmail.com
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