Published On Dec 21, 2023
“If you'll gather round me, children,
A story I will tell
'Bout Pretty Boy Floyd, an outlaw,
Oklahoma knew him well.
…
Yes, he took to the trees and timber
To live a life of shame;
Every crime in Oklahoma
Was added to his name.
But many a starvin' farmer
The same old story told
How the outlaw paid their mortgage
And saved their little homes.
Others tell you 'bout a stranger
That come to beg a meal,
Underneath his napkin
Left a thousand-dollar bill.”
Those words come from “The Ballad of Pretty Boy Floyd,” a song by American folk icon Woody Guthrie. And it perfectly encapsulates the complex and controversial legacy left behind by one of America’s most notorious outlaws. Pretty Boy Floyd was a robber and a killer, no doubt about that. He became the country’s new “Public Enemy #1” after the death of John Dillinger.
And yet, many people remember him as the so-called “Robin Hood of the Cookson Hills” for his generosity towards the needy and, most famously, for allegedly burning mortgage documents whenever he robbed a bank to get people out of debt. But was this reputation deserved or did Floyd simply benefit from good post-mortem PR?
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Further Reading:
Jeffery S. King - The Life and Death of Pretty Boy Floyd
Crime Library
https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-ca...
https://www.carnegie.lib.oh.us/Floyd
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-h...
https://www.odmp.org/officer/2512-spe...
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/2...
https://www.biography.com/crime/charl...