Bonnie and Clyde

Bonnie and Clyde (Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow) were infamous bank robbers who traveled the central United States during the Great Depression, often with various members of the Barrow gang.

Joplin

On March 22 1933, Clyde's brother Buck was granted a full pardon and released from prison. By April, he and his wife Blanche were living with W.D. Jones, Clyde, and Bonnie in a temporary hideout in Joplin, Missouri — according to some accounts, merely to visit and attempt to talk Clyde into giving himself up. As was common with Bonnie and Clyde, their next brush with the law arose from their generally suspicious behavior, not because their identities were discovered. Not knowing what awaited them, local lawmen assembled only a two-car force to confront the suspected bootleggers living in the rented apartment over a garage. Though caught by surprise, Clyde, noted for his cool under fire, was gaining far more experience in gun battles than most lawmen. He and W.D. Jones quickly killed one lawman and fatally wounded another. The survivors later testified that their side had fired only fourteen rounds in the conflict. Contrary to the account popularized in the 1967 film

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March 22 - 1933 - Blanche - Joplin, Missouri

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Bonnie and Clyde, after the initial volley, Blanche Barrow was seen walking down the driveway and into the street with almost surreal calm, trying to coax her runaway dog back to the garage and into the car.

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The Barrow gang was able to get away at Joplin, but W.D. Jones was wounded, and they had left most of their possessions at the rented apartment — including a camera with an exposed roll of pictures. The film was developed by the Joplin Globe, and yielded many now famous photos, two of which are shown above. Afterward, Bonnie and Clyde used coats and hats to cover the license plates of their stolen vehicles when taking pictures.

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