East bound and down, loaded up and truckin', we're gonna do what they say can't be done. We've got a long way to go and a short time to get there. I'm east bound, just watch ol' "Bandit" run. |
Buck Barrow, Clyde's older brother, showed up at the gates of Huntsville prison, two days after Christmas, on December 27, 1931, and voluntarily surrendered, to the prison officials. He told them, that after escaping earlier, He had gotten married and that after telling his new wife, that he was a fugitive from justice, she demanded, that he return to prison again, to serve out his time. After his pardon from prison, he swore that he would, "stay out of trouble". But, despite protest from his wife Blanche, and her family, Buck joined Bonnie, Clyde and W.D. Jones, near Fort Smith, Arkansas. Blanche reluctantly went along with him, to visit her new brother-in-law Clyde. After traveling to Joplin Missouri, they set up housekeeping in a rented bungalow. Clyde, posed as a Mr. W. J. Callahan, a visiting civil engineer, from Minnesota. He booked the limestone apartment house at 3347 1/2 34th Street. The apartment had a large comfortable livingroom, two bedrooms, a bathroom and kitchen. It sat on the corner of 34th Street and Oak Ridge Drive, on a quiet tree-lined road on Freeman Grove, and had a double garage in which they could stow away two of their three vehicles. Along with the apartment, he also rented a garage at 3339 Oakridge Drive, to keep their third motor car out of sight. Things were quiet at first, But after a while, the locals became suspicious of their visitors from Texas and called in the police. As a result of the gun battle here, two peace officers died. Constable Wes Harryman age 41 and father of five children died on the spot, as a result, Mrs. Harryman was forced to sell the small family farm to continue feeding the family. Detective Harry McGinnis died later that evening in St. John's Hospital in Joplin. He was three weeks away from marrying his fiance' Nellie Gager. |
Q: Cost of the Joplin apartment? A: $21.00 a month Clyde also (at the landlord's suggestion), paid an extra $1.00 a month (probably to appear civil minded) toward a neighborhood "nightwatch" service (provided by residential detective Mack Parker). |
The raid on the Joplin, Missouri apartment on Freeman Grove netted the police; Buck Barrow's Marmon car and a stash of weapons including a bloodstained 16 gauge shotgun and his pardon papers signed by Texas Governor Miriam Ferguson, his marriage license to Blanche Caldwell, several handwritten pages of Bonnie's poetry, a camera and several rolls of exposed Kodak film that the notorious Barrow gang had taken of each other. |
Veteran actor Bob Cummings was born in Joplin, Missouri on June 9th 1910. His father was Dr. Charles Cummings Sr., a surgeon who was part of the original staff of St. John's Hospital, where Detective Harry McGinnis died. His birth name was Charles Clarence Robert Orville Cummings. The "Orville" part, in respect to his Godfather, aviation pioneer Orville Wright of the Wright Bros. Bob Cummings moved to Los Angeles in 1935, two years after the Barrow shootout, to persue an acting career. He remembered his birthplace, opening up his own hotel on US Hwy 71. I don't know, but it's very likely that Dr. Cummings might have possibly attended to Det. McGinnis. |
Besides his own shows, he had starred in many great films, which included Alfred Hitchcock's 1942 thriller 'Saboteur' and "Dial M for Murder" in 1954. |
In keeping with his Godfather's passion, young Cummings also took to the air, being trained by Orville Wright himself. Cummings made his first solo flight at the time the above photo was taken. Cummings was issued flight instructor certificate No. 1, making him the first official flight instructor in the United States. He would charge $5 each, taking Joplin residents on a bird's eye tour of the Joplin area. |
