The James Younger Gang Goes Whole Hog On The Banks

Howdy folks and greetings from the Great Plains of North Texas!

We have a log floating around on our pond and the turtles use it to sun themselves and today it was in the 50's but sunny so this guy was out there warming up. Normally he's so skittish that as soon as I open the door he dives off the log but he must have been cold this morning because he just stayed there but was keeping an eye on me!

Well folks, I've been talking about the crazy life of Cole Younger who was one of America's premier criminals of the Old West in the late 1800's. I hope that title makes sense, I reckon it might be a tad redneck but Whole Hog just means the Boys were tearing it up in their profession.

The bank robbing business was very good to them financially and I don't think there was a bank they didn't successfully rob. The heat on them was mounting though. I don't know how many Pinkertons were hired to track them down, they seemed to be everywhere. So far three of the Pinkertons had found them and the Boys had shot and killed all three.

The gangs' affect on banks

With pressure increasing they expanded into other areas and states. What's amazing to me is that where ever they robbed a bank, then that town would increase the security of the banks dramatically but they could stroll right into a bank in a town that they hadn't robbed before and there was no security at all! lol. So this was usually a ridiculously easy situation for them.

It had been almost ten years since they robbed their first bank in Liberty, Missouri in 1866 and they continued robbing at will for almost ten years! Their gang was becoming famous too with all the newspaper stories for each robbery and dime store novels were being written about the gang and sold like hot cakes back East.

In some ways they helped the banking business by making them aware of the lack of security but the bankers across the country seemed mighty slow to adopt new measures. Probably didn't want to spend the money.

Easy pickins

When the Boys would scope out a target bank they'd just walk in and ask the teller to change a $100 bill. The teller would usually turn around and head for an open vault door and if that was the case then the gang would know it was an easy target bank that left the bank vault door open.

Then obviously next time they just walked in and demanded the money from the vault, handing the teller a grain sack to fill up. So easy it wasn't even funny. If a customer came in they'd take whatever money they had too, then tie the teller and any customers up in a back room or the vault and ride off.

Fear, loyalty and love

And forget about getting a good posse together. By this time everyone knew about the gang, that they were the toughest outlaws in the country and none of the townspeople wanted to go on a suicide mission. This made fear a big part of their success.

Also loyalty. The people of Clay and Jackson counties were loyal to the Boys and loyal to the Confederates so the Pinkertons could never get any cooperation from the locals. Jesse James even got married during this reign of financial destruction.

Cole talked all the time to his friends about going back to Texas for Belle and Pearl but like all bank robbers he needed to make one more big score so he could go back to her in style.

Thanks for reading folks, Cole's story continues tomorrow.
-jonboy Texas
the gentleman redneck

ps- ya know...you might just be a redneck if:

Your moms been involved in a fistfight at a high school sports event!