Bonus Video: Newsreel Footage of the Death of Bonnie & Clyde

Much like Texas Ranger Frank Hamer was on this day in 1934, you must be getting pretty sick of Bonnie & Clyde by now; yet the coverage given to the death of these notorious criminals slash folk heroes is nothing compared to what's out there in all. Clearly, interest in them has been high ever since they began their five-state killing spree in 1932, and shows no sign of abating even now, nearly 80 years after the fact.

I couldn't resist posting this authentic newsreel footage from the time; I think it makes a poignant and fitting farewell to the pair whose bodies died on that lonely road in Bienville Parish, but whose legend lives on, thanks in no small part to people like me.
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The Ending of "Bonnie & Clyde"

As has been previously discussed, Arthur Penn's 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde is definitely a film and not a documentary; nevertheless, in this, the movie's final scene, the viewer is able to glean something of what it must have been like for the real Bonnie & Clyde to go out in a blazing hail of steel-jacketed bullets - some 130 in all - when they were ambushed near Black Lake, Louisiana.

Today a museum in nearby Gibsland commemorates the lives and deaths of the notorious criminals, featuring the car used by Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty in the film, as seen in the clip above.  The clip also features Dub Taylor as Ivan Moss (who Dunaway refers to as Malcolm, for some reason, just one of the film's many gaffes).
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"The Story of Bonnie & Clyde" by Bonnie Parker

It's a little known fact that Bonnie Parker was a gifted writer, and may have even followed that path if circumstances had been different; here, then, is her own take on her exploits with Clyde Barrow including what must have seemed like their inevitable result, following the wanted poster that was used to dog them...


You've read the story of Jesse James--
Of how he lived and died;
If you're still in need
Of something to read
Here's the story of Bonnie and Clyde.

Now Bonnie and Clyde are the Barrow gang.
I'm sure you all have read
How they rob and steal
And those who squeal
Are usually found dying or dead.

There's lots of untruths to these write-ups;
They're not so ruthless as that;
Their nature is raw;
They hate the law--
The stool pigeons, spotters, and rats.

They call them cold-blooded killers;
They say they are heartless and mean;
But I say this with pride,
That I once knew Clyde
When he was honest and upright and clean.

But the laws fooled around,
Kept taking him down
And locking him up in a cell,
Till he said to me,
"I'll never be free,
So I'll meet a few of them in hell."

The road was so dimly lighted;
There were no highway signs to guide;
But they made up their minds
If all roads were blind,
They wouldn't give up till they died.

The road gets dimmer and dimmer;
Sometimes you can hardly see;
But it's fight, man to man,
And do all you can,
For they know they can never be free.

From heart-break some people have suffered;
From weariness some people have died;
But take it all in all,
Our troubles are small
Till we get like Bonnie and Clyde.

If a policeman is killed in Dallas,
And they have no clue or guide;
If they can't find a fiend,
They just wipe their slate clean
And hang it on Bonnie and Clyde.

There's two crimes committed in America
Not accredited to the Barrow mob;
They had no hand
In the kidnap demand,
Nor the Kansas City Depot job.

A newsboy once said to his buddy:
"I wish old Clyde would get jumped;
In these awful hard times
We'd make a few dimes
If five or six cops would get bumped."

The police haven't got the report yet,
But Clyde called me up today;
He said, "Don't start any fights--
We aren't working nights--
We're joining the NRA."

From Irving to West Dallas viaduct
Is known as the Great Divide,
Where the women are kin,
And the men are men,
And they won't "stool" on Bonnie and Clyde.

If they try to act like citizens
And rent them a nice little flat,
About the third night
They're invited to fight
By a sub-gun's rat-tat-tat.

They don't think they're too smart or desperate,
They know that the law always wins;
They've been shot at before,
But they do not ignore
That death is the wages of sin.

Some day they'll go down together;
They'll bury them side by side;
To few it'll be grief--
To the law a relief--
But it's death for Bonnie and Clyde.
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Now Showing: "The Death of Bonnie & Clyde"

When it comes to slicing and dicing history for the purpose of serving it up as entertainment, few do it as well as the History Channel; although often ridiculed (occasionally even by me) as the Hitler Channel, occasionally they manage to veer off of the subject of World War II long enough to cover the rest of history. Regardless, it is a reputation the Pop Culture Institute hopes to one day garner for itself, and learning what not to do is just as important as learning what to do.

Here as part of their investigation into the deaths of notorious gangsters Bonnie & Clyde, is Edward Herrmann narrating the story of the shirt in which Clyde Barrow was killed...
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Pop History Moment: The Death of Bonnie & Clyde

Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow's notoriety became immortality on this day in 1934, when they were shot and killed on a lonely stretch of road near Black Lake, Louisiana...

Shortly after 9 AM they had stopped to visit the father of one of their gang members, Henry Methvin; unbeknownst to them, his presence was a trap. Shortly after their arrival four officers from Texas - Frank Hamer, B.M. 'Manny' Gault, Bob Alcorn, and Ted Hinton - and two from Louisiana - Henderson Jordan and Prentiss Oakley - opened fire, riddling the pair and their stolen Ford V8 with over 130 bullets, killing them instantly.

Tiny, loquacious Bonnie and handsome, angry Clyde had captured the public imagination in the last two years of their lives, even though competition for attention was fierce during the the so-called Public Enemy Era. The glamour of their image set them apart, but was belied by the increasing squalor of their situation. For the one-third of the populace trapped by the Great Depression, a life on the run - no matter how dangerous - proved a powerful thrill, even vicariously.

More than thirty years after their deaths, enough mystique still clung to the pair for them to be portrayed by Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty - at the time two of the most beautiful and popular actors in Hollywood - in Arthur Penn's 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde. That they bore little or no resemblance to the historical figures they portrayed was irrelevant, since their presence in the film conjured up the glamour of their lives - even if it had originally been squalor tarted up as glamour.
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