Dillinger Quest

Ready, set

Nov. 24, 2011

OK, I'm finished raking leaves and have my black suit on. I'm all packed to go in search of John Dillinger.

I'm going to join my son’s in-laws for Thanksgiving dinner this afternoon and from there will head to the Super 8 in Clearfield, Pa. I should get there before midnight.

Tomorrow night I'll be at another Super 8, in Michigan City, Ind., the town where the lakeshore dunes are, and where Dillinger did time.

They are supposed to have wi-fi in those places. If they don't, I'll pack my Mac in a violin case and knock over a Starbucks or a bank.

I'm doing this pretty much in reverse, by the way. The first scheduled Dillinger stop is in South Bend, Ind., where he committed his last bank robbery. The last stop on the way home will be in New Carlisle, Ohio, where he robbed his first bank.

I don't have a clue where I'll be Saturday night. But that's all right, it makes me feel more like a fugitive.

I’m carrying a case of assorted stouts in the trunk. For two reasons: It puts me in touch with my bootlegger ancestors of the Dillinger era, and also I’m headed for Ohio and Indiana without an idea of the beer supply out there.

Happy Thanksgiving, all.

John F
Nov. 24

Don't eat too much turkey; it'll put you to sleep!

Reflections on Clearfield

Nov. 24

Made it to Clearfield, Pa., in just under four hours. The roads were clear so I was able to push it a bit. You may not want to read this to kids, because I only want to be a bad influence on adults: If you're less than 10 miles an hour over the speed limit, it isn't worth a trooper's time to pull you over unless it's a slow night.

Besides, this is a holiday, so they were out for big game—the drunks.

I didn't open so much as a bottle of beer till I got here. I just now polished off my first of the day, a double stout made by Green Flash Brewing Co. in San Diego. I never heard of them either until I read the label on this bottle. I highly recommend it to the black ale drinkers. At 8.8 percent, it has the alcohol content of light wine.

No Dillinger sightings yet because I'm still in Pennsylvania.

I had dinner with Dave and Linda, Matt's father- and mother-in-law, and their family. They have been inviting me to join them for several years now. The food, as usual, was terrific--turkey, yams, mashed potatoes, veggies, pies, cider, trifle. There was wine, too, and beer as well, but remember, I was behaving until I made it to Clearfield, a drive of about 250 miles or so from their house. 

Clearfield is a place nobody has heard of, I guess, but despite its obscurity it has a certain distinction. 

There are two exits for Clearfield from I-80. Between the two there is a sign telling you, if you read fast enough as you go by, that you're crossing the highest point on Interstate 80 east of the Mississippi River. That's one hell of a qualified claim, I agree, but still, the highest point.

Clearfield is also home to one of my favorite eateries, Denny's Beer Barrel Pub, which I will unfortunately have to skip yet again on this trip, as I had to do the last time I was in this neck of the Keystone State. I may be passing this way sometime next summer, and if I do, I'll make it a point to have a burger and a few Otto's red ales at the bar.

Real time note: vicissitudes of life on the road. The rechargeables in my Bluetooth mouse just conked out. It's the one recharger I don't usually pack, so I'll have to stop at a convenience store tomorrow and buy double As, along with fig newtons, spearmint leaves, and other forms of portable nourishment. 

Another great stout, I just learned as I was writing this report, is Boaks Monster Mash. It's a home-grown brew, made by the High Point Brewing Co. in Pompton Lakes, N.J., but it's billed as a Russian imperial stout. Those were stouts made by British brewers in the 19th century for export to Russia. The description on the label is "a big malty beer with lots of hops." Very tasty, and at 10 percent alcohol, it is getting me ready to go to sleep. 

Early wake-up call tomorrow. Dillinger doesn't wait.

Happy holiday to all and to all a good night.

Tracking Dillinger

Nov. 25

I don’t know if John Dillinger had time during the robbery of the Merchants National Bank in South Bend to stop and try the vegetarian egg rolls and green curry. If he didn’t, he missed something. Maybe he should have had lunch first.

Anyway, as you can tell, so far, so good. I ate egg rolls according to plan this afternoon, a little after three eastern time, at the Cambodian Thai restaurant at 229 South Michigan Street in South Bend, Indiana. That was the site of the last bank that Dillinger robbed. There’s no bank there now, just a shopping arcade.


The gang placed a lookout on the sidewalk outside the bank. A policeman was directing traffic at the intersection (I believe) of South Michigan Street and East Wayne. He heard gunfire in the bank. No one was hurt in that burst of fire. It was intended to get everyone’s attention and show that the gang meant business. It got the patrolman’s attention, but he was hurt, gunned down in the street when he came to investigate.

I have a few minutes of video of the block but I couldn’t do a whole lot of clowning around because I realized I was drawing a lot of attention to myself. Maybe people in black standing in the middle of South Michigan Street do that. I always try to disappear, but that can be a hard thing to pull off. Maybe I looked sinister. Or worse, official (God forbid).

Dillinger was working with Baby Face Nelson at that time, June of 1934.


South Bend has a lovely Main Street, and the rest of the town that I saw looks a bit sad. There are civic centers and other big buildings on Main Street, but a lot of the city has the flavor of Newark.

I’ve never been to Indiana before, so I’m enjoying the trip, but if South Bend is typical of Indiana, I can understand why Jeff lives in Brooklyn. [Editor's note: Jeff's hometown is Mooresville, Indiana, where the Dillinger family lived after they left Indianapolis. John Dillinger was living there when he committed the assault and robbery that landed him in the Indiana State Prison.]

Real time note: I just finished a bottle of Dogfish Head World Wide Stout. It’s good, but it’s expensive, so I don’t think I’ll buy it again. There are a lot of stouts that are more interesting,

I’m sitting in Michigan City, Indiana, right now. The highway where the Super 8 stands looks like every road in America with a Super 8. That’s all right, mind, because it reminds me that I’m on the road. But it’s kind of funny too. I don’t know why, but I’m laughing. Maybe because I’m on the road.

I got out to the lakeshore dunes in the failing light. But it wasn’t the failing light that you get at 4:30 back home.

There had been no road sign or sonic boom, but I crossed into the Central Time Zone today. It’s an hour earlier here, but because I’m still close to the time line, it gets dark earlier by the clock, but at that time it's an hour later and much darker back near the Atlantic.

I went to the Indiana Dunes State Park. The lakeshore dunes could be a hundred feet high. Maybe a million. What the hell do I know about estimating altitude? I climbed up one, and decided that—given that the whole thing’s made of sand—it’s pretty high up. I decided to be impressed.

The motel is next to a restaurant called the Texas Corral. I’m glad I brought a case of dark ales. There were only four taps. Two of them were light beers, and the other two were Miller and Killian’s Red, which isn’t even an ale but a lager.

I was reduced to drinking bottled beer at a bar. The steak, however, was fantastic.

On the way back from the dunes, I found the turnoff to the state penitentiary, where Dillinger did time but wasn’t very penitential, it seems.

I’ll head there tomorrow morning and see what develops. Maybe I can get a photograph of the place without being arrested.

This is from Harry, who is still not in jail.

Love to everyone.

Jack

Nov. 26

From this I can only conclude that you are in search of your Inner Bad Boy, and that your search for the perfect brew is your cover story....  Which will be found first, I wonder?

Dillinger Quest II

Nov. 26

Today was a good day and still is.

It’s not quite 9:30 and I’m in a Rodeway Inn in Wadsworth, Ohio. I didn’t know where it was until I read the little welcome card left on the bed. Just to give you a better fix on my location, “We are conveniently located between Akron and Cleveland just off Interstate 76 at exit #9.”

The card doesn’t mention the real reason I’m here. It’s the first motel in Ohio that I found next to a bar. That means I don’t have to drive home from the beer taps. I had tried another exit but they had no draft beer, so I pressed on till I found this place.

I started this morning by going back to the dunes. There is a section called the national lakeshore, but that is all residential. I don’t know what makes it national. I’m a national and I couldn’t get onto the dunes. [Editor’s note: Harry asked a uniformed man at the gate house, who said there is no public beach access to the national lakeshore. Harry had to return to the Indiana Dunes State Park to revisit the lake.]

Death can occur.

                                     View from above.


It has been a tourist draw for generations. I understand that, during the time that Dillinger was in state prison at Michigan City, there were a bunch of gangsters living in bungalows behind the dunes—Alvin Karpis (a member of the Barker gang) and Baby Face Nelson were here, along with some others. 

The dunes are fun. There is sand all over the parking lots, so there are new dunes in the making. They are hills made by the wind.

                            Dunes in the making.

Taking Route 20 back from the dunes toward Michigan City brought me to Hitchcock Road. That took me straight to the state prison. I can’t believe I was able to photograph the place without interference, but I did. 

Somewhere on Interstate 94 west of Michigan City, I passed a billboard for a vasectomy service, no scalpel involved, performed in the office. It was a two-for-one sale: "Get one side done; get the other side done free." No kidding.


The route to Bluffton, Ohio, the next stop in search of Dillinger, largely followed the Lincoln Highway, U.S. Route 30, which has always been a very interesting road whenever I have driven it. The Amish drive their wagons on it in Pennsylvania, for instance. This time no buggies, but a huge wind farm that straddles the Indiana-Ohio state line. It may run a couple of miles along the highway and stretches back into the heartland maybe as far. I didn’t have the opportunity to stop, and probably would have been trespassing if I did try to get closer to them, but those machines are beautiful. They are as graceful as steam engines.

Later in the afternoon, I stopped at a rest area on one of the Interstate Highways and there were three trucks parked with oversize loads. Each one was carrying a single blade for a wind turbine.

Dillinger robbed the Citizens National Bank in Bluffton in August 1933. There is an office of that bank still in the town. Certainly not a 1930s building. Maybe they rebuilt it after Dillinger left to make it harder to rob. I haven’t confirmed that the current branch is on the site of the earlier bank. So I’m considering it as a surrogate. But I saw it, and had an espresso at the coffee shop across the street.

From there I went 10 or 15 miles south to Lima. Several weeks after the Bluffton bank raid, Dillinger was captured and sent to the Allen County jail to stand trial for that robbery. Some guys, whom Dillinger had helped break out of the state prison in Michigan City (He may have thrown guns over the prison wall.), came to the jail and set Dillinger free. In the process, they shot and pistol-whipped the sheriff, who died a few days later.

I photographed the current county jail, but again, am not sure that it is the site where the Dillinger events occurred. And again, I am surprised that no one official intervened. Of course, for all I know there are law enforcement officers studying my grainy image on surveillance video as we speak. Goodness, I have crossed a state line since then. The FBI could have jurisdiction. God, I’m glad Melvin Purvis is dead. He’s the guy who tracked down Dillinger. He’d surely shoot my ass, too.

Stories I have read describe the Lima jail as attached to the sheriff’s house. The current building doesn’t suggest that kind of domestic arrangement. Maybe—perhaps like the Citizens Bank branch in Bluffton—they rebuilt it to discourage future attempts.

The center of Lima is very picturesque. 

                            HH in downtown Lima

I walked a few blocks from the jail to the traffic circle at the intersection of Market and Main. On the way I passed a storefront plastered with wanted posters. It was the Allen County probation office. I didn’t know anybody whose picture was posted there, so you can all relax. I didn’t see any of my relatives, either.

Lima is about an hour and a half from the first bank that Dillinger robbed, the New Carlisle National Bank in New Carlisle, Ohio. 

On the way there, I passed through Tipp City, Ohio, and “Old Tippecanoe.” I have no idea what that’s about. 

A Google search for ”Old Tippecanoe, Ohio,” turns up gibberish. A sign as I entered the neighborhood (I think it’s part of Tipp City) says it was founded in 1841,which is the year that William Henry Harrison, the original Old Tippecanoe, was inaugurated as president and died.

Anyway, there were a lot of old buildings there, and that was fun. New Carlisle, despite its youthful name is fairly old too.

The bank building [Editor’s note: dated 1882 on its façade] appears to be vacant now, but there are two large photos in the window that show the outside and inside of the bank as it was in the ’30s.

There is a plaque on the wall saying that this was the first bank that Dillinger robbed.

The beer is a lot better here than it was in Michigan City. I had two local brews, both from the Great Lakes brewing company. One was a spiced Christmas ale and the other was called a Dortmunder, which tasted almost like an amber ale. They also had Smithwicks, the Irish red ale, and Guinness stout on tap, so I was OK.

Real time notes: I just finished Hooker Imperial porter (Why “Imperial,” I have no clue; maybe it’s a brand name, so that’s why I capped the word.), and that was very strong, bitter, and good. I am now working on Samuel Smith’s oatmeal stout, which is always terrific.

I’m sinking into one of those gentle alcoholic fogs, so this is all that I will trust myself to write tonight.

This is your Road Warrior (You can read that as code for wise-ass.) signing off.

God bless us every one.

Jack

Nov. 27.

Wind turbines "as graceful as steam engines."  Only you could come up with that!

Alan

Nov. 27

There's a picture of the original Allen County Jailhouse at http://reocities.com/Athens/olympus/4172/ohio.html

As for Imperial Porter, that was apparently high alcohol the Brits exported to Russia (I read this somewhere this weekend, but cannot vouch for its accuracy.

Harry

Here’s a photo of the new county jail.

Alan

Not as scenic.

Harry

It's probably harder to break out of the new jail, but that's a case of the practical overriding the picturesque.

The change put me in mind of an exchange in "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid." Paul Newman is casing a bank and find that it has been renovated with security measures. The dialogue goes something like this:

"What happened to the old bank? It was beautiful."

"People kept robbing it."

"A small price to pay for beauty."

End of the Road

Nov. 27

Back home safe and sound. Nobody shot at me the whole time.

There is rain coming. I left it in western Pennsylvania, but it could be here in a day or two.

The ride in both directions was beautiful. The trees are uniformly bare except for one weeping willow near I-80 in Ohio or Pennsylvania. When the leaves are off, you can see the fractal subdividing of the limbs. 

Most of the fields are yellow now, and then all at once there is one that is a vivid green. 

Today's photo was taken yesterday morning. It's Lake Michigan viewed from the top of one of the dunes.

Dillinger’s bank-robbing career lasted 13 months. He left the state prison in Michigan City in May of 1933 and robbed the bank in New Carlisle in June. He committed his last bank robbery, in South Bend, in June 1934. Weeks later, in July, he was shot dead in Chicago at the age of 31. 


No doubt he was a bad guy and not somebody you want living next door, but he also looked for a short while like he was beating the system at the height of the Great Depression. So he became a folk hero.


Those 13 months included two jailbreaks, one that killed an officer and another that was almost comical because he used a toy gun. There were also shootouts in the Midwest, hideouts in Tucson. These are all official records, and official records are almost as reliable as folklore.


I only saw part of Dillinger country in three days. Who knows? Some day I may buy another case of ale and go back. Maybe to Indianapolis to see if I can find his grave.


I wonder where Melvin Purvis is. I'll have to look that up.