Why did Jesse James become so famous? Why was Jesse James one of the most famous outlaws of the Old West? Well, for starters, he had a great name,...
The Making of a Legend
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outlaws
Catching a Killer
How Bill Tilghman's hunt for outlaw Bill Doolin made the Oklahoma lawman a legend. When legendary lawman Bill Tilghman was killed in the line of...
Renegades of the Rails
Railroads were open season for Oklahoma and Indian Territory outlaw gangs. Glenn Shirley, the late historian of Oklahoma’s frontier history of...
The Big Payday
The Reno Gang struck it rich in train robbery. May 22, 1868. Outlaw Frank Reno leads a group of men to rob an Ohio & Mississippi train at...
A Botched Hanging
Tom Ketchum lost his head during the execution. April 26, 1901. Outlaw Tom Ketchum is hanged in Clayton, NM. In August 1899, Ketchum tried to...
The First Train Robbery
But it didn’t happen in the West… May 5, 1865. About a dozen men derail and hold up an Ohio and Mississippi train at North Bend, Ohio. They rob the...
Famous Last Words
Some memorable thoughts from those about to die. A number of men had notable last words as they faced the executioner. Augustine Chacon stopped to...
From Hero to Outlaw
It took John Joel Glanton a year to hit bottom. The name John Joel Glanton probably doesn’t ring a bell. But in the 1840s into 1850, he made an...
A First Brush with the Law
Billy the Kid gets caught holding stolen goods. September 23, 1875. Henry McCarty--later Billy the Kid--is arrested for the first time. He'd been...
The Mourning of Billy the Kid
The death of his mother set him on the wrong trail. September 16, 1874. Catherine Antrim dies of tuberculosis in her home in Silver City, New Mexico...
Climax Jim
Climax Jim was the darling of the Arizona press during the late 1890s. Thanks to the fertile imaginations of the old timers who knew him and the...
Drop Your Guns
Lawmen attempted to disarm outlaw Sam Bass, not realizing who he was. On July 19, 1878, the Sam Bass gang was in Round Rock, Texas to rob the local...