The Lives and Times of Bonnie & Clyde (Hardcover)

by E. R. Milner B.A. M.A. Ph.D. (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal
During the Depression, many gangsters left their mark, but no one did this better than Bonnie and Clyde. From 1932 to 1934, the Bonnie and Clyde gang made news daily and frustrated law enforcement officials as they managed to elude capture. They often kidnapped their victims and released them unharmed only after they felt safe. They only killed when they felt threatened. Their dramatic deaths during a shootout in 1934, supposedly in each other's arms, helped to make them a legend in the public memory. Milner (history & government, Tarrant Coll., Tex.) spent ten years researching the subject, resulting in this heavily documented book. The most interesting item in the book is the poem written by Bonnie entitled "The Story of Bonnie and Clyde," which pretty much tells the story. This is a good purchase for libraries that do not have any books on this subject; it would also be a good optional supplement to historical true crime collections.?Michael Sawyer, Clinton P.L., Ia.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
New sources are utilized to present a fresh view of the Bonnie and Clyde duo of legend. From an account of the string of deaths caused by the two to popular notions about and methods of reporting Bonnie and Clyde's exploits, this packs in fresh impressions of events and destroys many myths in the process. -- Midwest Book Review

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 200 pages
• Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press; 1st edition (January 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0809319772
• ISBN-13: 978-0809319770
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #366,563 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a sublime book about Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, January 31, 1998

By	Gary Wang (Chicago) - See all my reviews

If Bonnie & Clyde's story appeals to you, this book should come as the very best of surprises. It is a high-quality hardbound publication (Univ. of Southern Illinois University Press, 1996) that is beautifully done in all regards. Milner has done his homework.. this is an objective, well-researched and (above all) accurate study about the bloody Barrows. It is not a sympathetic treatment although the reader learns in this book that Clyde and Bonnie were, after all, very real people.. 62 years after Emma Parker and Nell Barrow Cowan did so in "Fugitives" (1934), Milner accomplishes the task of turning them into the mortals that they were. Thank you, Mr. Milner. The pair's background has always been rife with ambiguities and allegations: was Clyde an effeminate, incompetent punk with 'homosexual tendencies'? Did Bonnie change from a loyal and devoted daughter, sister and aunt into a cold-blooded killer? We are introduced here to two young people and their culture, which derived from the slums which comprised West Dallas, Texas (pop. 5,000,c. 1932) in the 1920's and 30's and therein lies the key to what makes this book really work. A professor of history at Tarrant College in Fort Worth, the author brings them to life by deftly recreating the era, which quickly becomes much less distant and remote... and they are all the more fascinating for it. Through understanding the period and social climate of West Dallas in those austere times, the reader views Clyde's life after 17 like a car wreck in slow-motion. We grow up with them, get to know about their families and learn precisely how things came to happen as they did. Debunked and free of myth and romance, the intrigue is still there. This is also a love story gone wrong. Milner is an analyst as well as reporter, and he makes some keen observations, theorizing (correctly) that the allure of this pair is inextricably linked to a powerful romantic aura. When the couple fulfilled Bonnie's self-prophecy by dying virtually in one another's arms, the die was cast. I have been of the opinion for some time that Clyde was certainly a sociopath, at best. That is highly arguable, based upon the facts that are responsibly presented here. Nor was the man gay. As a teenager, he was sodomized in prison; I can't determine how this rumor has managed to persist for so long, when there has never been anything substantial in his history to support it. At 16, he became infatuated with a girl from Wichita Falls and persuaded her to move to Dallas, where they lived together as man and wife for several months before she was located by her parents. She was followed on the author's timeline by a serious involvement with his first true love, who was supplanted by yet another deep love interest. Bonnie emerges as feminine, good natured and highly likeable. Her 1926 high school portrait, included here, depicts a very pretty girl who has indeed been forced to grow up too fast. Women of the day also regarded Clyde as "quite goodlooking". Their love and devotion to one another were remarkable: it comes through undeniably in Milner's biography. Clyde called Bonnie the "one person that I can trust". Despite their crimes, I came to like the people that I read about here. It's not at all difficult although they are not portrayed sympathetically: Milner cautions against the bias that is inherent in "Fugitives" and takes an objective stance, relying upon the facts to tell the story. They are the facts, too. If that's what you're seeking, the quest has ended: they are right here. Significant factors, such as youth and physical size are really brought home. The manager of the Red Crown Tourist Camp,in Platt City, MO (the scene of one of their most infamous gun battles) had mistaken them for students from a local college who were shacking up for some serious partying in those first days following the repeal of Prohibition. It makes sense: Buck Barrow was the eldest at 28, followed by Blanche, Bonnie and Clyde were both in their early 20s and W.D. Jones trailed along at 16. They WERE kids but Clyde knew how to handle a car.. his singleminded determination, stamina and skills were respected by lawmen throughout the Middle West. He repeatedly demonstrated an uncanny ability to shoot his way out of trouble, eluding no fewer than eight major police traps prior to May 23, 1934. Several of the feats (including one episode in which his car was blocked in a thunderous crossfire by policemen atop a bridge spanning the Colorado River) were genuinely astounding; Barrow had exceptional instincts, as revealed here. I have studied these desperadoes since 1968 and the author has disabused me of many incorrect assumptions. Encountering the elusive truth - finally - has been like opening a treasure chest, replete with a superb selection of rare photographs. Even the casual reader will find it difficult to put this book down. The Texas Ranger, Frank Hamer, a man who merits considerable respect for his own distinguished accomplishments as a lawman, appears to have contradicted himself in his recounting of the events of that Spring morning in 1934. Sadly, it appears that he did not step out onto the gravel road with the word "Halt!" as the fugitive's car approached. Indeed, no announcement of any kind was declared before Deputy Prentice Oakley sprang prematurely from concealment and fired two steel-jacketed bullets into Clyde's forehead, killing him instantly. Ivan Methvin's truck was, in fact, there as a decoy, in a manner almost exactly like that depicted in the Penn/Beatty/Dunaway movie. Clyde died instantly before Bonnie's eyes and, most significant, perhaps, is the fact that the six lawmen did indeed have the opportunity to attempt to arrest Bonnie Parker and lead her away from the scene alive. She screamed at the sight of six automatic rifles leveled at the car from a distance of only 20 ft.. to their subsequent regret, all six guns erupted. The order had already been given, they were low on sleep and poor judgment prevailed. It bothered each posse member until they died - Hamer included. That is highly poignant stuff. Many fine men fell before the guns of Clyde Barrow and his consorts and though an accessory, this unbiased record effectively demonstrates that Bonnie Parker never killed anyone. She fired at pursuing police officers in flight on numerous occasions but without incident (as the author shows, Texas Highway Patrolman Murphy was shot on Easter Sunday, 1934 by 18 y.o. gangmember Henry Methvin, not by Bonnie Parker). Frankly, I think that John Neal Phillips tome (393 pgs., complete with meticulous endnotes) on Ralph Fults/B&C, "Running With Bonnie & Clyde: The Ten Fast Years Of Ralph Fults" is more successful when it comes down to reconstructing actual events. Both books feature specific, credible dialogues based upon personal disclosure, police interviews and testimony. While Mr.Phillips' painstakingly researched work prevents this book from standing alone as the definitive work on this subject, E.R. Milner has also explored the archives. He merits acclaim and high praise for taking the initiative to look for the truth and telling it with great effect against a rich tapestry of Ford V-8s and flying gravel, cornbread and boiled pinto beans, prison brutality and Texas politics, poverty, a profound devotion to family and friends, the Depression, small town cafes and constables, living out of a car for weeks at a time, sacks of sandwiches and gunfire. Much, much gunfire, and all of it's attendant destruction. This is the co-definitive book on the lives of two people who will continue to occupy a prominent, albeit notorious, place in the popular history of 20th century America.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Flawed Masterpiece, July 11, 2001

By	Rick "Mad Dog" Mattix (Iowa) - See all my reviews

E.R. Milner has constructed a pretty fair history of the Barrow gang in The Lives and Times of Bonnie & Clyde. Using contemporary newspaper accounts and police records, he provides detailed accounts of even many of the gang's minor crimes, such as early gas station holdups, and we B&C buffs naturally want all the details we can get. There are some previously unpublished photos, which is a must. There is also too much dialogue for historical purposes, much of it taken, unfortunately, from Jan Fortune's error-strewn Fugitives, the ghosted 1934 memoirs of Emma Parker and Nell Barrow Cowan which in turn derived as much from Ed Portley's 1934 True Detective articles as it did from Bonnie's mother and Clyde's sister. There are quite a number of typos, mostly wrong first names and misspellings of surnames and it is equally unfortunate that Milner failed to visit many of the locations prominent in the Bonnie and Clyde story, where key participants in the events still live, such as Dexter, Iowa. Milner told me once he regretted not having gone to Iowa inasmuch as Dexter was the turning point in the gang's history just as surely as Northfield, Minnesota was the Waterloo of the James gang. Having recently reread this book, I also regret he didn't come to Iowa. The three gas stations the gang hit before going to the Platte City, MO motel were in Fort Dodge, Iowa, not Kansas. Speaking of Minnesota, a visit to Okabena would have raised considerable doubts in the author's mind as to the Barrows' guilt in the bank robbery there. No eyewitnesses ever identified the Barrows there but two men and a woman were later convicted of the Okabena bank job. Milner's epilogue leaves much to be desired. Clyde's mother was shot in 1938, as Milner reports, but not by "an unknown attacker." The would-be assassin was a former minor gang member ostracized by the Barrow family as a "rat" and the shooting resulted from a feud with them which also involved a number of bombings. Cumie was also more than "slightly wounded"--like Blanche she lost the sight of one eye. Little or nothing is recorded of the deaths of Bonnie's mother or other principal participants such as B&C ambushers Henderson Jordan, Prentiss Oakley and Manny Gault. Kidnap victim Thomas (wrongly named as Jimmy!) Persell is only recorded as having retired from the Springfield, MO P.D. And the sideshow "career" of the death car should have been traced down to its present whereabouts in a Nevada casino. In view of the errors and omissions, I feel I must drop a star from my previous rating of this work. Still, Milner did Bonnie and Clyde better than many before him and both his book and the recent Running With Bonnie and Clyde by John Neal Phillips deserve a respectable slot in any crime library.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Its on Film, October 20, 1999

By	rock hound "montynewton" (Austin, Texas) - See all my reviews

This book confirmed what has always been an accepted fact in my family, that Bonnie was basically executed. My grandfather worked at the Louisiana Army Ammunition Plant (LAPP - located about 10 miles west of Minden and 30 miles northwest of the death site) in the 1940s and was well acqainted with Henry and Ivan Methvin who ran a cafe near the plant. Ivan Methvin said that Bonnie was shot while she sat in the car screaming after Clyde had been shot in the head. He also said that Ted Hinton's movie camera was up and running and filmed the whole thing. The Hinton family has the film and has not to my knowledge ever released any of the footage accept the 20-30 seconds that shows up occasionally on television documentaries. All this shows is a quick scan of the death car with a bullet riddled Bonnie slumped over. The actual film is said to be 8 to 10 minutes. It is doubtful that Hinton would have preoccupied himself with a movie camera or would have been skillful or lucky enough to set up a tripod that caught the scene of death. However it is interesting that the Hinton family has not released additional footage. My grandfather also stated that at one time Methvin actually said that Clyde and Bonnie were stood up against the car and shot, and of course we know that wasn't true. One thing this book left out was W.D. Jones demise. Jones was at various times addicted to alcohol and drugs (morphine and demerol) after his days with Bonnie and Clyde. In Houston, in 1974, he was killed with a shotgun by an acqaintance over a drug transaction.