Key Information
Irish O’Malley & the Ozark Mountain Boys, By R. D. Morgan
2011 [ISBN: 1-58107-211-2; 264 pages, soft cover; 5 1/4 by 8 1/4 inch] $17.95
The Irish O’Malley Gang represented the final installment of America’s great 1930s depression-era “Super Gangs” following in the footsteps of both the John Dillinger and “Ma” Barker/Karpis Gangs. The final version of the outlaw band was the result of the merging of two separate and unique criminal enterprises, one deriving from a rural environment, the second urban in nature. Their story involved a small cadre of hard-nosed underworld hoodlums joined by an army of thrill-starved gangster molls and criminal associates, which eventually evolved into a loosely-knit organization. It’s members drifted across the Midwest committing a national headline grabbing kidnapping and several brutal murders as well as looting a dozen banks. Law enforcement dubbed the lawless band the most highly disciplined and efficient of the day. Their bank raids were well-planned and conducted in precise clockwork fashion. Not until the final months of the group’s existence did investigators, including J. Edger Hoover’s vaunted G-Men, connect the dots and conclude a single group initially dubbed “The Midwest Bank Robbers” was behind the epidemic of bank heists. On realizing this fact, Hoover’s boys began tracking the group like the hound and the hare. But, track them they did and with deadly efficiency.
The Contents
Introduction / v
Acknowledgments / viii
About the Author / ix
Chapter 1: The Birth of a Criminal Enterprise/ 1
Chapter 2: The Luer Kidnapping / 28
Chapter 3: A Gathering of Rouges / 51
Chapter 4: Six Daring Bandits Inc. / 56
Chapter 5: Public Enemies / 85
Chapter 6: Two for One: The Okemah Caper / 103
Chapter 7: All Hell Breaks Loose / 114
Chapter 8:Tulsa Townand a Visit to Arkansas/ 131
Chapter 9: The Jig Is Up / 139
Chapter 10: A Shocking Turn of Events and Two Redheads Dead / 154
Chapter 11: Escape and Murder Most Foul / 172
Chapter 12: Last Gasp / 200
Chapter 13: The Rest of the Story / 225
Sources / 250
The Author
R. D. Morgan is the author of six non-fiction books dealing with early-day Oklahoma lawmen and outlaws. He has also written numerous articles for Oklahoma newspapers and historical magazines on the subject. Morgan spent his childhood in the East Texas oil patch country and his teen years living in a small Iowa farming community. Upon graduation from high school, he knocked around a year or so working construction before entering the U.S. Army where he served as a law enforcement officer. After his military career, he attended the College of the Ozarks before being employed as an electrician and maintenance supervisor for many years in Missouri and Arkansas. On retirement, he moved to Oklahoma to fulfill his life-long desire to commit his energies full-time into writing and researching depression-era American history. Morgan developed a passion for the subject as a teenager listening to his Grandfather’s tales of life and culture in Middle America during the 1920s and 1930s. Morgan and his wife, Naomi, currently reside in Haskell, Oklahoma.