The Newton Boys: Portrait of an Outlaw Gang - Hardcover

9781880510155: The Newton Boys: Portrait of an Outlaw Gang
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Scores of bank heists and train robberies which plagued the nation during the roaring twenties, including the biggest train robbery in America's history, were pulled off by the daring Newton brothers. When interviewed at length, the brothers told a tale which is both dramatic and poignant and which, here now in print, grips the reader with its colorful picture of a bygone era. Here are the unembellished but often witty and spellbinding descriptions of their robberies from Texas to Canada, their flamboyant lifestyles when successful and, when unsuccessful, trenchant descriptions of the lawmen who caught them, and the prisons which punished them.

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From the book: "Bonnie and Clyde was just silly kids bound to get themselves killed. We wasn't at all like them. We wasn't thugs. All we wanted was the money, just like doctors, lawyers and other businessmen. Robbing banks and trains was our way of getting it. That was our business." (Willis Newton)
From Publishers Weekly:
Roaring '20s-era bank robbers Willis and Joe Newton were the subject of a 1976 documentary film by Stanush and Middleton; this oral history--based, they say, on the same interviews--offers an unusual portrait of Texas and the Southwest, especially because of the brothers' belief in the essential corruption of business and government institutions. The book, dominated by older brother Willis, is unwieldly, but should interest Texas history buffs. "We wasn't thugs like Bonnie and Clyde . . . we was just quiet businessmen," declares Willis of the four-brother gang; he goes on to explain how his initial false imprisonment on a theft charge led him to disregard the law. Joe, on the other hand, "was kind of following the leader." In 1924, after many successes, the gang's $3 million Illinois train robbery led to their capture. Amid the book's wealth of detail about their movements and tactics emerges some homespun wisdom; Willis declares that prisons are more schools for crime than for reform. Willis died in 1979 at 90, and Joe died in 1989 at 88; the informative epilogue indicates that some more authorial interpolation might have made for a smoother read. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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  • PublisherState House Pr
  • Publication date1994
  • ISBN 10 1880510154
  • ISBN 13 9781880510155
  • BindingHardcover
  • Edition number1
  • Number of pages332
  • Rating

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