all this. the people at the time on the left never used the word intelligent to apply to ronald reagan's but thanks to the work of clarence goodwin and natalie sanderson we now know that reagan personally wrote over 600 essays on government in the late 1970s which became his radio shows. we know that he in fact had sought a great deal at great depth about how washington works and how government works and that he was prepared to lead in ways that were quite extraordinary so in many ways i saw what we did in the contract with america as standing on ronald reagan's shoulders. we participated as young reaganites in the 70s and worked with the ministries in the 80s. at one point i went down with a group of hard-line activists young members and we complained to the president gave this was about 1987. that he wasn't doing enough and we yammered at him for about an hour. i will never forget as we were walking out he put his hand on

my shoulder and any president that puts his hand on your shoulder gets your attention. reagan was one of those historic figures. he said look it took us half a century to get into this mess. i have been the first seven years. maybe you guys will have to do the heavy lifting on your own later. ..

>> this is particularly special to me because so many people in this room have been a part of the process of my writing the

book. i mean, everybody. i'm looking around and seeing people who counseled me through the book proposal writing process and encouraged me when i thought i could never get it done, friends who called me up to find out about how the book was doing, my family, husband's here, so many people here who basically help me get a book done, and so it's really awesome to be sitting here tonight in a room full of people who have supported me along the way. i even think, actually, over a couple years ago when we moved to maplewood six years ago getting coffee across the street, with a lot of you writing, working on various creative projects, and so it's cool to be here tonight, and so i just want to share a little bit about the story that captivated me for the better part of two years. first, for those of you who

don't know, a little bit background about me, jonah's given some, but i'm a journalist, and i've had good fortune to work in television, print, and documentary films over the past 15 years, and, also, when possible to travel in pursuit of a great story, and i just wanted to sort of start out, i guess a lot of people here who know me well wondered how i wrote a book about a computer scientist and mathematician, especially those who know me well. as an english teacher major and writer, i have no experience in computer science. i avoided all math and got through college without taking any of it and didn't pass calculous and the answer to that is simple. it's that the book captivated me enough for the math and not for

some of the more sensational moments of the life, but because of the story and what he accomplished, and if you ask me to explain the algorithms today, i can give you a broad explanation, but i can't tell you what's at the heart of them, and people who worked with him or work at the company today still can't, some of them. that gives you an idea how incredible the math was behind what i'm going to tell you a little bit about. so the story of danny really is a come flex one. he had all facets in life that i found difficult to capture in a character study and as a writer, and i'm just going to read a little bit from the preface of the book because that gives you an idea of the seemingly desperate parts of his life and

what made the story in some ways for me saying truth is stranger than fiction, and danny's story i believed from the very beginning was more unbelievable than fiction. in the spring of 2011, a friend asked if i was interested in a job producing a film tribute for the 9/11 attacks. that friend is here, mike fouler, thanks for first introducing me to the story. at the time, i had no idea what it would become. the subject takes place with a passenger on the plane that crashed into the north tower of the world trade center. from there, the story takes on a life of its own. the story of daniel, danny mark, the first victim of the 9/11 attack, a story of an extraordinarily gifted young man believing anything was possible and let nothing stand in his way. an all-american kid moving to israel against his will, falling

with the country, and serving as an officer in the elite israeli army. trained to hunt and kill terrorists and who, in a tragic twist of irony died at their hands. there was a husband and father who spent years and was a billionaire almost overnight. of a theoretical mathematician that would change the internet forever. that sums up a lot of the story. danny was born in colorado in 1970, and in many ways, he had a typical all-american childhood, the eldest of three boys, child of two doctors, a very bright, interesting family, and there were some ways, however, in which his childhood was a little bit different, and some of the

things i learned were early indicators of what was his success in the field of computer science and business. the paimpts believed strongly in nurturing the children intellectually teaching math and science at the kitchen table while others were watching cartoons. the family also had, i learned, the first home computer in their entire neighborhood. their father purchased a kit that you built at home, and then later purchased one of the very first personal computers which was the apple 2. by the age of ten, danny and the brothers, also very talented were teaching all shows in the neighborhood who bought a computer how to program it, but at the age of 14, danny's life took a very unexpected and unwanted turn. his father, who was increasingly enamored with the jewish

ideology associated with it uprooted the family and moved them all to israel. danny was a teenager and furious. you can only imagine what that was like if any of you had teenagers if there was teenage rebellion, that was difficult for his parents. he want to israel kicking and screaming and angry and, in fact, some people say really department speak to his father for a year or tried to avoid speaking to his father for a year, but he was really too bright and grounded and some say wise beyond his years to really ever go off the rails in anyceps of the word, and his rebellion, instead, was his own determination to succeed in a way that anybody who challenged him that he would prove anybody who challenged him wrong. he started out at the local gym where he built physical strengths into biblical life proportions, sailed through high school, went to a science and

technology school in jerusalem which is still there, and made it through with very little effort and without having to go to class very often, and by age 18, he was really fully entrenched in israel and came to love the country. in some ways, it's a very intense place as probably all of you know and a place where you grow up really fast, and i think that that is what really solidified the character traits in him and pushed him to become the incredibly driven individual. at age 18 like most, he joined the army. that was not uncommon. he lived there for years so it was common to join the most elite unit of the elite army, a counterterrorism unit, and up until the late 80s, it was hand selected, and so when danny

decided he was going to make it into the unit, most people were sort of saying, okay, good luck with that, and that sort of begin this path that he went on to defie all of the odds. he was not only admitted, but within two years, he became an officer. from there, he went on to the mit of israel. the israeli institute of tdges where he really became interested in the hardest problem by math and science for the first time. also, the idea he wanted to use the high level math to solve problems, juggling two of the hardest degrees, and at the same time, a wife and two young children and a full-time job at ibm research lab. on top of all this, he won the top student award, and in 1996, he was bound for mit. he was actually accepted to the

top ten graduate schools in computer science and engineering, and he decided on mit, and this was one of the really wonderful parts of the story. the reason that danny decided to attend mit was because of one professor in particular. that professor was tom latin, who had been at the lab for computer science for years and was a legend in the rare field of theoretical computer science, and danny pulled the book out of the library one day, and he looked at it and thought this is the person i want to meet. this is the person i want to work with. i have the book at home, this big, and i couldn't even understand the first sentence in the book. [laughter] the title takes up an entire index card, but danny saw the work of something spectacular and more importantly, he learned

he spoke the same language as the professor, tom latin, a rare abstract language of theoretical computer science that so few people speak. this was back before the time when anybody knew about the word "algorithm" in terms of sort of an interesting, almost sexy term used today if anybody read the news today. google came up with a new search algorithm announced today with much fanfare, but this was back when algorithms were not really seen as having much practical application. the colleagues were working on a way to end at the time what was call the worldwide waste. if you think back then, when you click and immediately gratified with a response online that back then, the mid to late 1990s, you would click and hear that chirping and the beeping and the modem dialing, and cross your

fingers, and then you hear that infuriating message, please wait, server's busy, try again later. you dial up again. the whole thing was very tedious, and it was really, really one of the greatest impediments to the growth of the interpret at that time and certainly the biggest impediment to growth of business on line. if everyone dialed into one website wanting to buy something and they couldn't get there within a few minutes, they'd go somewhere else. everybody was working at the problem in their own way, and most people were working on it in ways that were effective, made sense, giant farms with tons and tons of servers, and if one crashed, the other servers picked up the slack, but then the more traffic increased, the system started to fail as well. people used other sorts of very

high level computer science technology like cashing and mirroring, and these all worked, but not on a large scale, so the question before danny and tom and their colleagues at mit was how to scale the internet and how to grow it into something that was actually could be used universally. danny, at the time, was an mitt student looking for a thesis and came up with an idea called caching, a complex idea, a set of algorithms to root data and it's a scheme of assigns data a unique set of numbers, and he wanted to use it and thought he could use it to help root traffic on the internet in a more effective and faster way. fortunately, for him, a lot of people initially didn't see

potential in the paper, but tom did, and by 1997, they formed the start of a company that promised to end what was being called the worldwide waste. danny, tom, and the cofounders took the company public in the fall of 1999, grew it very quickly, and they had an ipo in october of 1999 that made them overnight billionaires, break out star of the dot-com boom. i'll read one more select that tells you what it was like at that time. this was a time, again, right at the height of the dot-com boom, and the technology was like a lot of other dot-com businesses at the time, an exciting place to be. 201 # broadway in cam bridge, a nondiscrypt cluster of offices with all the trappings of a trendy startup. whiz kids barely old enough to

order a beer showed up on skate boards, a delivery truck had ice cream and pizza. a group of programmers known as the java weeds for the all nighters spent time producing the graffings and took naps in a hammock. will, a student at mit, was one of them juggling course work with the part-time job where he worked overnight overseeing operations. the officer hopping, people rolling in chairs from one desk to the other, tossing footballs and microwaving an endless surprise of burritos. there was so much energy you didn't realize how exhausted you were. it was not uncommon to see two employees playing miniature golf in between a few desks. the atmosphere was so fun and

intox kateing it was easy to lose track of time. there was an exciting time, and the company, again, just rocketed to the top they accompanied big names on the web, and in ?erch, the company in the infancy, and so so danny's story is spectacular so the ending to the personal story is not a large part of the book, but it is, obviously, one that people asked a lot about because it is true that danny was the very first victim of the 9/11 attacks. we don't know exactly what happened on that flight on that day, and we never will, but what we do know from the evidence gathered by the 9/11 commission

and some very harrowing and courageous flight attendants made to the ground before the flight was steeredded and crashed, we know that passenger in 9b, danny, he was on the way to los angeles that day for a business meeting, was engaged in a struggle with one of the terrorists and was killed when somebody stabbed him from behind at 31 years old leaving behind a wife and two children. yet another tragic twist of irony, that day proved so much of what danny predicted for the internet came true. that day was the web equivalent of a hundred year flood, news organizations, federal agencies turned to the internet for information about the disaster that was unfolding, and websites crashing, fen lines down, and in his short time, danny predicted

there was going to be a time where the interpret could not handle the traffic and promised his technology would work to keep these sites live when that happened, and that day, even though the company was struggling. this was after the dot-com bubble burst, struggling financially, and they lost the heart and soul of the company, but they worked through the next few days and kept a lot of the websites live like cnn, if you logged on that day, you may have noticed it went down, but a few hours later, it was back unand stayed live the next few days, and provided an amazing amount of information, largely because of the technology that tom and danny first wrote as professor and graduate student at mi. that's probably enough about his story, but, you know, it's just great to be here tonight to talk about the story. i hope that really the take away from the book is the idea that, you know, there's a quote flt

book from the father of computer science has a wonderful thought which is that an algorithm must be seen to be believed. i love that because when danny wrote algorithms as a starving graduate student, a lot of people didn't see the beauty in them or believe what he was proposing to be possible, and there were academic conferences that rejected his paper and professors who said this is crazy. companies said what you're proposing cannot be done. please leave. he knew, and he had faith in a big idea, and so i think the take away from the book, i hope, is to inspire anybody with an idea that's greater than themselves to just go ahead and pursue it no matter what anybody says, and put everything into it, and hopefully is works out

so thanks, thank you so much for listening. [applause] i thought you could talk about the challenges you faced. i thought it would be a tough story to follow without the math and science expertise. not an excuse for any of us as a layperson to get into the meat of any of this, and i was curious how you approached that, and were able to. >> a great question. it was intimidating at first because i was writing about all these people, all the characters mostly in the book are still lives and working in the field of computer science, professors at mit, engineers at google and my yo soft, all very smart

people. when i first started the book and said, oh, i'm writing the book about tom, and everybody would say the first thing they said to me is, oh, you're writing about -- tom, the smartest guy i've ever met, and this is coming from a ph.d. at mit, and i thought, oh, gosh, did i write about this person, the smartest person they ever met? the wonderful thing about writing about all these people is that, well, tom is a professor and has been for so long, and he was really good about sitting down with me and explaning what the company does and what danny wrote, and in layman's terms, and one of danny's best friends, a marketer for the company, he didn't understand the algorithms, the one hired to do the marketing for the company, but he said my job was to explain it in a way my grandmother would understand, and if i could do that, then i succeeded. that was my take for the book was that if i could explain this in a way, and, you know, i used

basic analogies in the book like the pony express, that my grandmother could understand, then i would succeed, and 10 i just approached it from ground level, and i figured i approached it the way i approached any difficult topics in reporting, like, i say to myself, this is just as complicated as political gerrymandering or, you know, treatment for cancer or gene therapy or any story i've done where if you're interested enough, you take it down to a basic level, but i couldn't have done it without the help of everybody and computer sciences who walked me through the language when i was, frankly, excel -- completely lost. >> how much time did you spend in israel? you were speaking with people highly educated, so there was probability not a language barrier, but i was curious. >> no language barrier. the barrier was the fact that danny's family was reluck at

that particular time to have -- reluctant to have the story told, and i felt that if i couldn't sit down with them and meet them and talk to them about the book and in some ways get their blessing, it would be very difficult to write. >> right. >> and so the first thing i did before i even really started writing the book was to go to israel, meet with the family, and i had no idea what to expect. they are very religious people, they are lovely people, warm, incredibly intelligent, both parents are doctors, practice in jerusalem, and his brothers are extremely successful in business and high-tech, but they didn't tell me much more than, we'll meet with you in jerusalem. i had an address in jerusalem, never been to israel before, and i don't speak any hebrew, and i got on a plane and went, met my sister who is here tonight, she

traveled with me which was great, and the first thing i did was to sit down with them, and i think really what i did was explain to them the story to tellfuls not how he died, but a story of how he lived, and i told them i spent a couple months with the co-producers talking to the people who said just because of danny, i've done this. i've done this. i started this company i never thought i could. i said, do you realize how your son changed people's lives, and with that, they said, okay. i wish i could have spent more time in israel. i visited the company where the professors are still there, and still remember him like it was yesterday. it was really amazing because he just spent three years there. >> wow. cool. well, i'm going to open it up now to questions from the audience. i promisedded my friend, andy,

that if he passed around the e-mail list, i'd let him, and i hope you sign up if you are not on already, you can ask the first question. >> all right. i had a great time reading your book, and there was one part of the book that interested me, which you went true quickly and wanted color on what happened. it was the period of time after tom and danny built the model, have the algorithm, but now they have to get it to work. in other words, they have to transfer it over to the servers, and, you know, jumping with a white bard, you know, on to the computers and to make these electrons do their magic was, to me, a really, really impressive part of what they did, and from

what it sounded like was it just a bunch of gurnet grads? sounds amazing. >> a great question, one i hit at in writing the book because i, myself, could not understand, and i had danny's notes in my hand, you know, saw all the math, and i couldn't understand how that you're making use of the technology. you just don't see it. use the word "magic," and i think it is a good word because

you don't see it, and so much of the power in it is the math, and so answer your question, so that summer, they had an idea, submitted it to the company, was not anything, but then they had some help from some friend in the business school from a business school, and you know, what you are doing could have practical applications if you turn it into a business, and that's where they had a big learning curve, and they described how they described how they went to the library and checked out business 101. they had no idea how to write a business plan. they were academics. they got a lot of help from some folks at savings and loan, friends, bright people who believed in them, but, essentially, yes, they did then say we're going to build a

prototype. they already patented the algorithm, early in the process, but build a prototype, program these servers using these algorithms with the intelligent software that will be able to circumvent traffic and route data effectively and content, and how exactly they did that, i don't know. it was the magic of programmers. these guys were undergraduates at mit. i say "guys" because they were all guys, the programmers at that time, and, apparently, the programming is not the hardest part. i mean, it was a lot of long late nights, but they created a prototype essentially by using different floors of mit's lab for computer science. the 7th floor was paris, 6th floor london, 5th floor new york, servers on every floor and simulated web traffic, and by the end of the summer, they

realized that the more data and information they loaded into the system, the better it worked. that was just this incredible moment where danny was at belt labs that summer doing an internship, needed money to pay the bills, but they calledded and said, hey, you know, this thing is working, and that's whether they realized, okay, we could have a business model there, but it was not until they had the money to program the servers and place them around the world. >> [inaudible] >> they were computer sciencists. they were programmers. >> next question. >> yes, thank you very much for your talk, enjoyable, and really easy to picture everything you were describing. i'm wondering how you went about the nuts and bolts of recording, especially this difficult information. do you take shorthand? a recorder?

what did you do to capture it? >> well, that's a good question. i get that a lot in, like, writing classes and as a journalist, and people look at you nervously with an entire view and you take the notes like she can't possibly be writing all this correctly. i do shorthand, but i record at every interview with a digital tape recorder so i can go back and put it on the computer and have the files there and transcribe every word, you know, precisely, and that's pretty much the secret. i have both though because i had that experience as a reporter where i've gone out with a type recorder that failed somehow, and so i'll never make that mistake again. i only have pen and paper with me as well, but, yeah, tape recordings. i interview almost 120 people for the book, and it was either type recorded in person, or i set up a recorder on my phone so i could digitally record the

phone calls and keep all the files, and that's always important too when you write a book about people who are in positions of prominence in case they come back to you and did you misquote it or anything like that. that was important to me. >> hi. >> hi. >> i want to ask a question. so this is, obviously, a very complicated subject. as a writer, what inspired you, that this was something you didn't connect with, you said you were not diversed in math. what was it that made you inspired to write the book? >> great question. it was the person. you know, it's interesting writing about somebody, you know, spending two years, like, inhabiting the life of this

character who was so large to everybody who knew him, but i think that to answer your question, i decided to write about him after, again, we did the documentary tribute to him, and i realized early on that we'd be sitting in the room with these people, i mean, seasonedded corporate executives of huge fortune 500 companies, legendary professors at mit, commanders in the israeli army, and every single one of them would look at me and say to this person that they met ten years ago, 12 years ago, inspiredded them to do something today, and i greese, you know, i just felt like that was so unusual for somebody his age, you know, to have died tragically at age 3 # 1 # and left behind this incredible, not only a company and the set of algorithms and

flood technology that survived, but all the people who couldn't put a finger on it, but when he walked in the room, that changed the dynamic and made him feel like they could accomplish something. the best part was the technology that's so complicated that when they went out with the white board and mit academic language, you know, people were very confusedded and didn't really understand, but a few people said to me, you know, created an idea that they didn't know what it was, but they knew they had to have it. that was really funny to me. these were people who, you know, wrote checks for a lot of money, and they didn't really understand it, but they just had this sense that this guy was going to be big, and that was just fascinating to me.

>> you said he was not that into business, just a scientist. people who new him well, what was that trajectory? somebody who would have been the google ceo type or someone committed to, like, science and things and that? >> well, i got a lot of different answers. i think in some ways, that's the heart breaking question because everybody who knew him, even for five minutes, said to me they were left wondering what he could have done, and pretty much everybody unanimously who i interviewed and also people who knew him, you know, in all different arenas from israel to here said that they have no doubt that he would have been a household name today, and i do think that's, i think he absolutely would have been, and what he would have done, that's fascinating because he was so

successful in so many areas of his life, and he would have never been satisfied just to stay at the company he created. in fact, he, after the ipo, the company, one of the first things he did was to go reenroll to do his ph.d. which he never finished because he left to start the company, so he really had -- and somebody told me, actually, they asked him, well, it's going to be so easy for you to go to mit and do your ph.d., just write up the secret thoughts of the company, and you have your ph.d.. he looked at them and said, no way. i would never do that. i have to come up with some great idea, and he was already struggling with what that would be, and so he was never -- he moved so fast, and he really could have accomplished really great things, and so many people

noticed him from an early age. i spoke with the cofounder of yahoo, and he told me that tens of thousands of people came through the officers in the first, you know, few years of yahoo's big boom, and he remembered danny and thought, you know, he would have been -- for what it's worth, people who new him, but people in israel said he could have come back, some great people like benjamin netanyahu or others who spent time in the army, in the united states at mit, could have gone back and had a great career in politics in israel. he was very political, and he loved the country. i think he would have gone back to israel at some point and done something amazing there too so i don't know. >> i know we had one in the front. >> [inaudible] >> it's part of the story. they came up with the name -- it's just so symbolic to the

dot-com boom. they founded the company when, you know, the big companies were amazon.com and ebay, and names that did not necessarily make sense. they were not traditional blue chip company names. at first it was call cache, a double meaning as the cache of cool, but also cache technology. someone said, you know, that's a terrible name. [laughter] we really need to make this a lot cooler, and it was danny's best friend who was the marketing officer of the company said, you know, what about, i don't know, something hawaiian. it was that sort of impulsive, and he had ties to hawaii, opened up a dictionary, leafed through, and found a bunch of words, and it means in hawaii,

clever, cool, smart, and so that was the name, and they came up with a list of hawaiian words, and then that was it. >> speaking of clever, cool, and smart, i know all of your fans are wanting to know what's next for you. could you tell us? [laughter] >> what's next? oh, okay. i don't know yet. i'm actually just -- well, the book came out two weeks ago, and so i'd love to write another book, and i would love to expand on danny's story in some way. i don't know what that'll be, but i think has potentially life beyond the book, and so just thinking about it, i'm very hesitant to, you know, you spend so much time on the story, and the book comes out, and then, i don't know. i would like -- my kids are little, but like a kid leaving for college, you know, i don't

want to let go. i'll find i way, i hope, to continue working with the story in some way. >> a movie. >> yeah, sure, maybe. >> now i know speaking of the fans, all the fans want a chance to greet her, buy the book, and sign it. there's a book signing upstairs. i just thank you, molly, so much for coming. >> thank you so much. >> thanks to all of you. [applause] and we have a little present for you. >> thank you. [applause] >> congratulations. >> i really appreciate it. [cheers and applause] >> thank you. [applause] here's a look of books published this week:

>> as a young child, i faced racial discrimination, and i didn't like it. ask my mother, father, my grandparents, great grandparents, why racial discrimination, and they would say, that's the way it is. don't get in trouble. don't get in the way. but in 1955 when i was in the 10th grade, 15 years old, i heard of rosa parks. i heard the voice of martin luther king, jr., on the old radio, anded words of dr. king inspired me to find a way to get in the way. in 1956 with my brothers and sisters and some of my first cousins, we went down to the public library in the little town of troy, alabama, trying to get a library card, trying to

checkbooks out. we were cold by the librarian that the libraries were for whites only and not for colors, but on july 5th, 1998, i went back to the public library in troy, alabama, for a book signing for my book "walking with the winds," and a hundred of black and white citizens showed up, and they gave me a library card. [applause] walking with the wednesday is a book of faith, hope, and courage. it's not just my story, it is the story of hundreds and thousands and countless men and women, blacks and whites who put their body on the line in a difficult period in the history of our country to end segregation and to end racial discrimination. >> no need to register to join the club. read the book and post your thoughts at any time on our book club chat room, booktv

booktv.org/bookclub. >> mr. gardener recounts the infamous gangs robbery of the first national bank of northville, minnesota on september 7th, 1876 and the two week man hunt that followed. this is an hour and ten minutes. >> it is friday night. going to have some kind of a show. you know, i found that the best time machine is music. books are a close second, and i

really try to transport the reader back in time with my books, but music gets you there instantly. you hear a bob dylan song, back in the 60s. you hear a steven foster song, you're back in the 19th century. let's go back in time to 19th century missouri when even in the worst of thymes in a civil war and in later the notorious james unger gangs, people had great songs and music that they sang. ♪ ♪

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♪ ♪ [applause] >> thank you. [applause] all right. 1876. you know, that summer, june 25th on the banks of the little big horn river, montana territory, george, arm strong, customer, and 200 men in his command are wiped out by lakota and chiian warriors. that summer, a man was shot in the back of the head in deadwood, south dakota, wild

bill. there were swarms of locusts that covered the skies of the midwest. thousands and thousands devouring the barley, oats, and wheat of minnesota and iowa and missouri. the damage was so extensive, for the last several years, that amounted to 8 million dollars by 1876, and that's 1876 dollars. the panic of 1873 was still felt in 1876. it cost all kinds of jobs. it dropped the prices of crops. many businesses failed. the grand administrationfuls rack with scandal. corrupt officials part of the administration, and there were all kinds of hearings going after various parties, but there was one thing that was very, very exciting in the summer of 1876, and it was occurring in philadelphia, the famed centennial exposition. tens of thousands of people visited the exposition every

day, and they saw all marvels, wonders, inventions like telephone, typewriters, telescopes, a rapid fire weapon, a foot pedal drill for dentists, the newest life sailing devices for sailors, all kinds of wonders there going on. there were so many people going to the exposition that there were special trains that left from all points from the west, the midwest, and you got a special ticket to take you to philadelphia. tens of thousands of people each day went through the gate, and thousands of people rode the railroads east ward to visit the amazing thing. in northfield, minnesota, the banks' cashier went with his family to philadelphia to see the fair, and the other employees had to fill in while he was gone for a couple weeks

there in september. while all these people were going east to the fair, in missouri, there were eight men that boarded a train about st. joseph, missouri, going north, and they were not going any fare. they were going to have a little fun in the place of minnesota to spend a couple weeks up there. they were the notorious james unger gang, jim, bill, and charlie pits. they had about their persons three to four resolvers each, loaded down with ammunition in the belts, and they rode with dusters on over their clothing. now, historically, a tocker is met to protect the nice clothes from the dirt of the road. there's not any paveed roads in 1876. when you ride a horse, you get pretty dusty. they were met to protect the clothing, but they concealedded weapons handedly. why minnesota?

why would the gang, again, the horse back outlaws, most successful outlaw band in american history, why go north? in july of 1876, there was a successful haul at rocky cut missouri, near otterville, the town of otterville today, the small town, on the banks of the river. they got $15,000, but the first big mistake came from the robbery, and that was a new recruit. they recruited someone who was not really quite as trustworthy and was not as loyal and seasoned as the rest of the gang. his name was hobs carrey. now, hobs carrey's share of the loot was $1200 from the 15,000 hall, but he was obvious about spending the money, and after a short time, he was out of it all but $20 # lost in the gamble halls of joplin and elsewhere. the police on to him, they captured him and questioned him,

and hobs confessed everything. not only did he confess the role in the robbery, but named all the other gang members part of the gang. he also told about where they like to hide out. he learned quite a bit in the short time with the gang, so it immediate it fairly hot in missouri for the jameses and the ungers and others because of the detectives on the trail. when it was hot for them, they went to a place where they were least expected. minnesota was that place. no one in minnesota ever expected the gang to go there, and they were not hunted there. there was another reason to go to minnesota, and that was revenge. jesse james, if anything, was all about revenge starting with the civil war and the bush whackers, retaliation, getting back to the federals for what they have done or perceived to have done, and later as an outlaw, someone attempted to harm jesse or his family, he was out to get them, and this was well known, and there was a man from liberty, missouri, an

attorney named samuel hardwick, who made the mistake of assisting allen pinkerton's efforts to capture the james brothers, and he worked with pinkerton for a midnight ride in missouri in january of 187 a. in that raid, the pinkertons surrounded the house, threw through a window, broke a window and tossed in what's known now as an incendiary device to start a fire to light the interior an set the house on fire, but what it did was explode. it didn't just set a fire. it was called a grenade. they thought it was intended to blow up the house from the beginning. they were not in the house as believed, but the family was there, and jesse's mother maimed for life, am pew fitted her arm,

and worse, jesse's half brother, a young boy, was killed, fatally wounded by the exploding device. once jesse learned that hardwick had a role, not hard to learn this because somehow the news got to the newspapers. the pinkertons couldn't keep a lid on it. it was known that hardwick played a role in the raid. the first thing hardwick did was move from the farm outside the town into the town of liberty for protection. he went about armed when he was going about his business, but after a few months, the pressure was too much, and hardwick fled the state, and the place he fled to was st. paul, minnesota. it was known he went there because he wrote letters back to the paper, and jesse was a reader of the newspapers and learned where hardwick was. there's reasons to go to minnesota, hide out, and the other to get a chance for

revenge on hardwick. these eight men arrive in minnesota by train. they first go to the twin cities, and they spend a couple weeks in st. paul, in minneapolis, and now they have a lot of money on them from the rocky cut robbery. they go to the gambling halls. 2341876, it's wide open towns. there are gamebling high schools. they were trying to keep their identities secret, they felt pretty relaxed and pretty safe in minnesota, and they did draw lots of attention to themselves by the way they talked. they had a missouri draw or dialect that stood out in minnesota, and the way they dressed, again, i mentioned they had dusters, broad rimmed hats, tall boots with big spurs, the big spurs, not something you normally saw in places like st. paul and minneapolis.

they also committed several social faux pas wearing the hats in the dining room of the hotel. you know, they actually drew a lot of attention to themselves, but the interesting thing is that the people there, although they were curious, and they questioned them about where they were from and where they came from, they believed the lies of land speculators, cattle men, and once they gave the explanations, the alibis, the characterizations, people believed them and did not question them anymore. ..

the first place they decided on was mankato minnesota. mankato had three banks and they scouted out each one of them. they ride into town but there is a large crowd on the street that day and not only is there a large crowd in front of the bank but they are pointing at the outlaws. they are pointing at them and they are worried. they think they are discovered and in fact earlier that day there was a man who recognize jesse james. he claimed to have been from clay county missouri and he knew that james assante said hello jesse how are you doing? jesse tried to ignore him and roadway but this man went into one of the banks and said you

better look out because i just saw jesse james and the bank people laughed at him. no way would jesse james be up here. later they believed him but not then. there are all these people pointing at them and they had an encounter earlier where someone who thought they knew jesse james and so they rode out. what turned out to have been the reason all these people were pointing at them they were pointing at the really nice horses that they were writing because they have spent a lot of their money on horses. $200 or more at peace for the saddle mounts. it was very unusual in minnesota to see someone riding a saddle horse. generally when you travel about in minnesota you went in a buggy or hooked up to a wagon and drove into town. he didn't see people riding horses especially groups of five or six or were happy so these people not only did they see these beautiful horses but also was unusual. then these dusters they wore were almost identical.

almost made him look like they were wearing uniforms to some extent so when more than two or three were together it was in usual and drew attention. they could've brought the bank and mankato but they didn't. the second choice was northfield minnesota about are the miles south of st. paul. northfield was appealing for a couple of reasons. one is it was a town of 2000 people. it was a college town carleton college just a few years old at that time but northfield only had one bank. mankato had three banks of the logic of the outlaws was gee all the money must be in this one bank. it would a divided up in mankato but what was very appealing to people like jesse james who was a true southern partisan and headstrong southern political beliefs one of the investors of the northfield bank of first national bank was a man named delbert haynes. delbert haynes was first commander in the civil war and

later successful as joshua lawrence chamberlain famous for his -- but he was the general in the civil war. after the war he was a governor of mississippi that carpetbag governors how they referred to him down south. he had done a great turbulent administration there and in fact once the democrats gain control of the mississippi legislature they threatened impeachment and rather than be at impeach delbert haynes resigned and went to northfield because his family operated a milling business they're in northfield. in fact the main part of town is e-mails square and the mill was jesse eames and sons and they operated that smell. today it's small to mail their so if you buy a serial it's it says northfield minnesota. this was very appealing. it has the money of a carpetbagger and jesse like the idea of writing out of town with thousands of dollars at belonged

to this carpetbagger who had flocked to the north of the civil war. the date for the robbery september 7, night -- 1876. they ride in twos and threes and come from different directions. about 10:00 in the morning some of the gang members actually go into the first national bank right on division st. and this was a very common procedure when they robbed a bank. they would go in and ask to have a bill changed as a 10-dollar bill. this gives them an opportunity to see where the cash during the safest and how many employees are working that day so they did going to the bank and these individuals leave. some of them go and have a meal at a local restaurant. some of the gang were seen in the saloons in town having a few drinks and then later about 2:00 the men start converging on the first national bank. three men were to go into the bank and pick up the robbery. two would be on the street and then three would hang back in mills square to protect their estate route.

the three men that entered the bank are frank james bop younger and charlie pitts. the men who are going to be on the outside in the street are carl miller and cole younger and jesse junior younger and -- sitting on their horses in mills square. almost immediately people are suspicious. in other townspeople curious but in northfield there was this foreboding when they saw these men. there were individuals who stopped and said this doesn't look right. they saw the dusters and the saddle horses. there was one man actually followed for three men frank bob and charlie as they went to the bank and went inside. he tries to get into the bank but he had gotten off of his horse and was going to close the door and he meets js alan face-to-face and grabs him and says don't you holler. of course js alan struggles and breaks free and runs down the street. what does he do? he hollers and he says get your

guns boys they are robbing the bank and its heard all down the street. there's a young gentleman sitting in a chair across business trade a young medical student. he is having a break from college and he sees what is happening and he immediately stands up and yells robbery, their robbing the bank. the alarm has gone off really within seconds of the gang trying to rob this bank. as soon as js alan rounds the corner around the scriber block he is yelling the bank is being robbed in their men on the streets that hear him. almost immediately people start going for their guns. the citizens are not going to allow the bank to be rocked. they are not going to allow them to take their money. you have to remember at this time there's no federal deposit insurance to protect your funds to let that money is stolen you are not getting it back. it's gone. really they are rubber ring each person individuals there's an incentive for them to resist these robbers. they don't know who they are at this time. they only know that someone is

robbing the bank. where did they go to get their guns? in minnesota people were out walking around with a six shooter on their hip. they're certain places know where the guns are and where you buy a gun is a hardware store. just around the corner from the banker to hardware stores and one of the stores as soon as they hear the alarm and people are shouting and there's all this commotion one of the employee starts taking guns out of the cases and laying them on the counters with ammunition so they are grabbing shotguns and revolvers. one of the hardware -- store owners had a rifle at the window at the front of the store. he grabs his rifle and races up to the corner and they start blasting away at the ministry. by this time the three men have ridden around the corner to support the guys inside the bank so you've got five men out of the street riding back-and-forth shouting at townspeople get back inside. go back, get back inside with their guns over the heads to scare them and to get them away

so they can buy time. now you can imagine the confusion for people in northfield. everyday citizens may be shopping or in a store and they see these riders going back and forth. it does not enter their minds that something bad or horrible is happening. it defies any kind of logic that something like this would have been northfield. there has to be some other explanation to what's going on. it turns out that they're supposed to be a big show by evolutionist named professor lindgaard and professor lindgaard was going to have a show and part of the show he had two balloons that were going to rise up and he was going to do this for the public. they get people to come inside and pay for the show. some of the first thoughts are oak of us is to advertise the show. this is not any kind of a robbery or a shootout. this is a great way of advertising the show. there is a dentist matt has an office on the upper story on the

second floor not far from the bank and he steps out on the landing. as he steps out the robbers guild get again and they are firing towards him and their stuff popping off of the building. he jumps back in and ask what's going on? that's probably a wild west show going on terry at he goes back and get shot at again. it took a couple of times. it was so beyond imagination that this would be happening in this little town of 2000 people were these horrible things don't happen in northfield. this is going on constantly. initially the outlaws are not shooting to kill. the townspeople are shooting to kill. they are actually trying to kill liesman that they have determined are the robbers and the bad guys and sell manning with his remington rifle takes a a -- at the robbers. he kills one of the horses and the collapses in front of the bank. he has to run back to get another round in.

henry beeler the medical student there was an old civil war -- in the house hotel which is stored to down so he runs through the alley and cousin and grabs the carving and goes upstairs into the danbury house and has a perfect view down below where the writers are -- riders are going down. he fires insensible it through his artery and quell miller falls and bleeds to death right there on the steps. one man is already killed and sell manning a little bit later shoots him dead and he's lost two members on the street. the seconds are ticking ben devries in the seconds are ticking by are because of the her rogue employee in the bank. he remembers the cashier when to philadelphia to the exposition?

amanda took his place was the treasurer. that day he was the acting cashier. his name was joseph lee haywood. the three men burst in and alonzo bunker leads him to the window and they have got three revolvers pointed at his head. at first you think some friends are playing a joke on him. nobody robs -- who are these guys? quickly he realizes these men are up to no good and they are very serious. they keep yelling who is the cashier? cashier? where is the cashier? alonzo bunker silent and frank wilcox and other employees silent teary joseph lee haywood is at the desk cashiering and he says calmly he's not in. the cashier is not in today and he wasn't. they all jump over-the-counter and who is the cashier? frank james says you are the cashier. open the safe. he resist. often the people in charge whether it's the cashier or an

agent would try to deceive robbers and outlaws so the first thing joseph says it's on the time law. he probably heard the story that time law. time locks were just coming into vogue at this time. a time lock was designed to be engaged at the end of the business day and to disengage at the beginning of the business day so no bank and its right mind would have a time lock engaged. they couldn't conduct any transactions. the whole reason for a time lock to prevent outlaws from kidnapping of banker in the middle of the night and taking them to the bank. as a time lock on there and it doesn't matter whether you're the owner or teller at cashier you can't open that safe until the clock strikes the right time and disengage but the outlaws new this was a lie to buy time by haywood and they said that the lie lie open the safe. frank james starts to go into the ball than haywood leaps over and tries to slam the vault door on him.

there's a scuffle so all this commotion and confusion resistance which they weren't expecting as the seconds ticked by and it's making it deadly for the men in the street and that is what they lose 10 men. all kinds of things are happening as haywood bought time inside the bank. with the gang didn't know was that had he gone into this vault and tried to handle that safe that was open and have been unlocked the bulbs were not disengaged and if you turn the handle and pull it open there was $15,000 in that state. instead they are rummaging around looking for the cash drawer. bob younger and subscripting up some spare change and scripts. it's about $26.40 and that's all he gathers. they never get into the ball to never get into the essay. while they are struggling with haywood alonzo bunker the teller panics because he sees frank james draw his revolver and

pointed towards haywood and then he fires it over haywood said. unhcr doesn't know this but this is to scare haywood and to shock them into opening the safe and alonzo bunker thinks they just murdered haywood and alonzo bunker bolts and runs for the backdoor. charlie charlie runs after empires one shot and hit the blinds back to the door and unhcr burst out the back. charlie follows him and shoots at him again and the bullet hits bunker shoulder. he staggers and keeps running. this is the confusion the robbers are dealing with and things are going wrong. anything that could go wrong did go wrong as they are trying to rob this bank. frank james fires and charlie runs a knife along haywood's throat. haywood is not cooperating. in fact he's basically knocked senseless and yells murder, murder. he hits him with his revolver and at this point cole younger keeps writing up to the door of the bank and says, out there

shooting all of their men. he writes up three different times and finally bought younger and charlie pitts burst out the front door and look for the horses and bob younger's horse is dead. frank james is the last one to leave and out of pure meanness and spite and vengeance is his crawling over-the-counter he aims his revolver at haywood and puts a bullet right through his head and murders him. frank wilcox witnesses the murder and then he he flees at the backdoor himself. frank james rushes out and they are scrambling for horses. bob younger races down the sidewalk. people like and sell manning are shooting and cole younger says kill that man on the corner. they're dodging back and forth along the stairwell and finally he start shooting through the stairway and trying to get and sell manning. most of the gang are mounted in bob younger as he is there at the corner there is one more shot that comes from the danbury house motel.

it shatters bob younger's elbow. bob younger cooley tosses the gun to his left hand and keeps blasting away but as the men are writing off he looks back and says don't leave me i'm winded. cole younger gallops back up and post them on the horse and six men galloped out of town and leave two of their men dead in the street. it only takes about seven minutes for this to transpire. it was seven minutes of high excitement of terror and mass confusion and it truly was a melee in the street. joseph lee haywood is the hero because he has prevented these funds from being taken from the bank say. to give you another motivation for haywood to resist the robbers combat haywood was also the treasure at carleton college. he know all the money from the college was in that safe. had that money been taken the college could have been around so he had lots of incentives to resist these robbers. there were other heroes in

addition to haywood. there were some individuals who couldn't find guns so they threw rocks at the robbers. not only were they dodging olives but dodging these missiles coming through the air and disrupting and distracting them. another hero is a man named george bates. george bates is a drug is. the first thing he finds is a shotgun. they can't get the shotgun to work so he tosses the shotgun aside and gets a hold of the new revolver but there's no ammunition. this is what he does. he steps into a doorway and every time a rider or outlook comes he shouts now i've got you. this would distract the robber and he would laze away. he would wait for the next robber and jump out, i've got you. that was his way of disrupting the robbery. so these men wright out of town. what comes after is a two-week

manhunt and the manhunt is very detailed in my book the largest manhunt in u.s. history up to that time and also the largest gathering of man hunters up to that time. in fairness these people were shopkeepers and farmers. there were a few professionals at the james-ganger gang if you are experts at anything it was getting away. they were experts at escaping and alluding posses. they had done it that ever since the civil war. they were very adept at getting away from these posses. one of the things that was so disappointing there were two professional police forces in minneapolis and saint paul and they were immediately telegraphed sent men send guns we have had two men killed. not only haywood but a local citizen had been fatally wanted.

they needed help from the professionals. st. paul and in the opposite of always been highly competitive and sports business and it turns out they are very competitive when it came to chasing outlaws. they were jealous. they did not want one forest to get all the glory so they refuse to work together. have they worked together there is a good chance that this manhunt would have stopped sooner but they would not. the gang was also good at spinning their lies as they are riding through the woods of minnesota to the west and southwest of northfield. whenever they encountered a farmer for someone on the road they'd say we are looking for horse thieves. we are the posse after the outlaws and people accepted it. people were very innocent at that time and he saw a bunch of guys with guns and oh yes could we borrow a saddle?

go and get those outlaws that they were good at fooling people as they were escaping through the minnesota woods. the other thing that assisted them with a detriment to their escape was the bit was his cell. the big woods doesn't exist today in minnesota but at that time it was 100 miles long and 4260 miles wide. it was very thick all kinds of hardwoods and underbrush. there were no good maps and the policies often got lost especially if the posses were from around there because they have posses from all over the state. the outlaws were getting lost as well and often they had to take captive guys to help them fully and escape the men who are chasing them. near mankato what really led to the downfall of a portion of the gang was when they captured a man named thomas jefferson dunning. they wanted him to guide them around and mankato is very complicated. of course it was the edge of the big woods. thomas jefferson dunning wasn't the best guide and he also told

some stories which confuse the outlaws. some of over obvious lies. he said he didn't really know the terrain. he said his family would be looking for them because they were expecting him back right away. the gang has a meeting and decide we can't use this guy. what do we do with him? apparently frank and jesse wanted to kill thomas jefferson dunning. the younger brothers did not want to kill him. the younger brothers prevailed and they made thomas jefferson dunning promised not to say anything. they said if you don't say anything give us your address and we will send you a nice gift once we get back to missouri. but if you do give us up it doesn't matter if it's six months from now or 10 years or 20 years we will come after you. thomas jefferson dunning is let go and he goes right to his house and he doesn't report it immediately.

he's really stressed about what should i do. eventually decides to tell his boss and hopes the outlaws are captured. the lost ries straight into mankato on by this time a lot of the man hunters had given up. the police forces were heading back home and people thought the outlaws had skipped. this really put new life into the manhunt and all of a sudden the minneapolis and st. paul detectives turned around and head towards mankato and get on the trail of the outlaws. they almost capture them just outside of mankato at a place called pigeon hill but again it was the jealousies that allowed the outlaws to escape. instead of waiting for the rest of the posses one of the police forces decides to forge trade ahead and grab the glory. they made such a commotion and racket as they were chasing them the outlaws realized they had somebody close on their tail and left the campfire. in fact a fire was still burning some of the posse members said

they saw some of the brush where the outlaws have just fled. anyway this rush defeated the efforts to capture the gang. they had a heated argument and jesse and frank told the younger brothers we should have killed thomas. the younger and the others had such horrible wounds that it was lying them down. his elbow had shattered and it was very painful. jesse suggested they leave behind in the younger brothers decided to split up. as evidence as soon as jesse and frank take off they steal a couple of horses and they get away. they actually escape all of the posses and more posses as they are writing through southern minnesota into iowa. the younger brothers only make it to the area around miguel you north of the deal you minnesota. there is another hero to the story and my favorite hero.

his name was oscar sorbo. he was a teenager and he's out in front of his house north of miguel you. he is milking the family cow. it was so muddy wet that they actually lead their cows up to the road. i should mention after the robbery was committed there were two weeks of the most awful downpours of any of minnesota resident had seen before. these outlaws were trudging through swamps and drudges. there were 7000 lakes and between the each lake was a marsh so it was quite visible. oscar sobel and his dad are milking cows. two strangers come walking down the road in one of them runs his hand along the top of the cow and he says good day and the father says good day. as soon as they walk by oscar

sobel said that is the outlaws. the father says those were nice man. keep milking. no, oscar finish ease his pale and starts following them. his dad says you be careful. oscar is out on the road in the gills back to his dad see how nice these men are? look at these tracks. and the tracks were prints because the soles of their boots had worn off. they actually had toe prints in the mud from the bottoms of their boots. oscar sorbo knew these guys were the outlaws. he followed them at a distance and software that tracks when into a patch of woods and goes racing back and says i want to tell the neighbors what's going on. his father again is really hesitant and reluctant. these are the outlaws and you're going to get hurt. oscar sorbo runs to the

neighbors and alerts them. he says i have to alert the sheriff and the father again no, we afford to do in the horses hitched up to the wagon. sorbo will not take no for an answer and finally his father agrees to let him take the farm horse. it's a big overweight horse and oscar is galloping into town seven miles and the horse is pretty much exhausted and collapses. they both go tumbling and oscar is covered with mud head to toe. he does get to the town of medelia amick said to where the sheriff is and he says i spotted the robbers. he thinks he's crazy. he's covered with mud and what does this kid know about outlaws? he says one of the men we saw had his arm in a sling so that the sheriff said those are our men. they take off. the shops are closed and people take horses and buggies and go racing for lake hans stood to

capture these outlaws. they are surrounded on the river. there's a shootout. bob jim and cold receive even more of wounds. cold younger said he had 11 wins from these episodes in northfield and here and in fact when the brothers are captured jim younger and coal are so shut up that the doctors to treat them think they're going to die. jim younger went took a -- that one up to the roof of his mouth. their pictures as you will see in the book taken after they were captured and you can see how awful some of these ones are. cole younger side was swollen up the doctors thought they were going to die but one of the most amazing things after these men are captured and this was the biggest story in minnesota ever about the outlaws hunt. huge crowds calmed to medelia to see the outlaws and there is a shift. people are sympathetic to the

outlaws. they killed two men in northfield but these outlaws are famous. they seem to be nice boys. they are christians and there is one big crying j.a.g. after another as people go through and talking about their childhood in their troubles in the war and quoting the bible. people are brought to tears especially the women. half younger who is a handsome chap they bring him bouquets of flowers. every town these outlaws go through on their way to the jail in fair bow they are basically celebrating. people want to shake their hands it's a cultist celebrity. even the minnesota newspaper said these men had it not been such a horrible thing they were doing this is one of the most amazing feats that they were able to last this long and two of them frank and jesse escaped

to missouri. just to finish up the story and i detailed a manhunt in the book cole younger jim younger and bob younger are charged with murder for the death even though none of them shot. they are charged with murder. they're likely to be convicted by a jury but there's a peculiar long minnesota on the folks that allow them to escape the hangman. the outlaws said that only a jury could administer the death penalty. only a jury could do that so if you plead guilty to murder you don't have a jury. you have to judge that decide your sentence. the judge can't give the death sentence. he can only give life in prison so all three men plead guilty before the judge. there is no jury colon they get life in prison. they spend over 24 years in prison. bob younger doesn't make it out of prison. he has died from tuberculosis and cole younger felt that bob

received wounds to the long and he thought they made them susceptible. jim and coal are paroled. they are not allowed to leave minnesota and you can kind of imagine guys who never had real jobs before it was hard finding work. these are middle-aged men now so they find jobs for them. the first job they get they are traveling salesman selling tombstones. jim younger eventually gets a job in a cigar shop but he felt like he was a freak. the famous outlaw and killer jim younger. jim younger suffers depression. he wanted to marry a woman but because he was a ward of the state he had to get permission from the governor was denied and he committed suicide. that suicide -- he is told that he must never come back to minnesota. he doesn't want to come back he also cannot exhibit himself for-profit.

he returns to missouri and dies in 1916 at the age of 72 kind of a beloved figure in missouri. frank and jesse most of you know that story. jesse is assassinated by his own gang members. northfield really is a direct line to that the assassination. once the james younger gang is broken up they don't have the same men. these aren't guys that can stand out in the street and take bullets. they are not loyal or trustworthy and certainly alvin charlie ford were not trustworthy as it turns out and they assassinate jesse. they are in collusion with missouri's governor. jesse was very suspicious and i think frank thinks if they can get to jesse they can get to me. he surrenders. part of the deal for his surrender is that he will never be sent to minnesota and the governor honors that deal. when minnesota sends a

requisition for frank james it's denied consent dock with the excuse that frank had several charges that frank is never sent to minnesota and he never goes there as well. frank lives to a ripe old ages well. he dies in 1915 but once cole gets out of prison franken cole had always been friends and thought together in the war and that friendship was maintained especially since cole younger and the other brothers would never reveal who the two men were. they never said publicly that it was frank and jesse james. have they said that that would have been a a reason to get frank tried in minnesota. right after cole gets out he goes to the partnership with frank james on a wildwood show called the cole younger and frank james wildwood show. remember they couldn't profit by exhibiting him -- themselves. he gets around it.

he does not appear as part of the show. it wasn't a very long-lived episode. there was a falling out from the partners that they had. they remained partners until the end of their days. i guess you know the thing that struck me the most about this story were two things. the townspeople that took up arms and thought this gang of outlaws and defended their town but also the thing that struck me was how two men actually escaped the largest manhunt in u.s. history up to that time. it was incredible and it still remains incredible. we still don't know exact no frank and jesse made their final way to missouri. it's still a bit of chemistry that the northfield raid one of the events in the history of the james younger gang. i should throw and i'm a native masseur and born and raised here and i wanted to revisit that legend. when i grew up jesse was a hero

to me and i wanted to visit the real jesse. i thought this particular episode had not uncovered in as dramatically as it could be. i want to end with one song and i know we are going to take a few questions. the song is a historic ballot called cole younger that talks about the northfield raid and on my new cd called outlaws songs of rustlers robbers and rogues. i usually do this on the banjo. this is a tenor guitar so i want to play it. thank you all very much. ♪ i love to talk about the old west. ♪ ♪ ♪

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>> we have cameras in the back with c-span filming. if you have a question please come to the microphone to ask it >> i guess i was going to say after they captured the youngers that to james boys escaped. when was the next sighting of them? was it months later in missouri? how long did it take them to get from when they left minnesota back to missouri? >> the james boys were in missouri by early october and they really were never cited. the detectives felt like they had a lead and they have discovered. they had spies in jackson county and clay county. counties. in fact there was one man that they tracked to a doctor's home

near independence and this man had a nasty wound above his knee. that was the same place that frank was supposed to have been. the st. louis police chief said his detectives to independence to sneak around and see as this are manned? the detectives telegraphed back yes this is frank james. they send more men and surround the house and captured this man. they drug him out of the house and took him straight to st. louis. they let the st. louis newspapers know that they captured frank james. it wasn't frank james. his name was john gooden. the st. louis police chief really didn't want to give up on this man. he may not be frank james but i know he rode with jesse from minnesota and he is one of the robbers. he wasn't. he would received a wound in a squirrel hunting accident is doctor signed a paper saying he was being treated. he was essentially essentially

kidnapped in end up suing the police chief for $20,000. >> and body. >> the robberies on september 7 and after four weeks they were back in missouri if not sooner for short time and then they went to tennessee. >> did you ever do any research into the man who claimed to be jesse james when he was at merrimack caverns about 30 years ago? >> his name was dalton wright? >> j. frank dalton. >> he wasn't jesse either. >> did you do any research on that? >> i really didn't. there are lots of stories of various outlaws who supposedly were not killed.

butch cassidy was in killed billy the kid wasn't killed john wilkes-booth wasn't killed. the thing about jesse james is of all those faces the most solid evidence was photographs and in the photographs he suffered two wounds in the civil war to his lungs and those scars are very visible in the photographs. frank's family identified him as jesse james so i mean there is no question that jesse was killed. there was more than just dalton. there were several impostors that claimed to be jesse over the years. in fact there were lawsuits by the james family suing individuals who claimed to be jesse james. it's these cases that led to the dna examination several years ago in the 1990s where they exempt jesse's body and carney. the family wanted to end this once and for all but it didn't. it's never going to end no matter how much evidence.

>> also i am sure you visited northfield and the little museum they have their. i was there a year ago and it's really quite interesting. >> it's spectacular. it's been restored to 1876 the way it was at the time of the robbery. there were furnishings that were there at the time and every september -- i was a fair couple of weeks ago they reenact the raid in seven minutes time. it's called the defeat of jesse james days. several times a day in front of thousands of people they reenact this. they have bleachers set up on the other side. i will say this as an historian i really relish the opportunity to see people on horseback even as scale. you don't always get that when you're researching subjects and here i was in front of the actual bank seeing none -- people on horseback and i feel like that helped me on the description of the robberies in

my book too presented as a accurately and exciting and terrifying as it was at that time. >> he hi. i'm curious about some of your background and training as a historian. >> okay well i was born and raised in missouri. my family took vacations every summer and we looked at every battlefield and historic house that there was. national park sites but you know i majored in history and journalism and double majored in college and did american studies for my masters degree. my summer jobs i worked for the national park service. i spent one summer in harpers ferry and another summer at the stonewall jackson house in lexington virginia but i've always been fascinated by history and i also like to write about history. of course do the thing is that in my pursuit in my research of various subjects i'm a music lover too.

i would find references and journals to a particular song orange demand and i would make note of that as well and they feel is a said earlier that music is a great time machine. i really try to mimic that with my writing and make my book of valid source to tell that story. >> i i'm also from missouri and i have been down highway 44 and seen that jesse james hideout and the caverns and all that kind of stuff so i'm aware of it being kind of a celebrity but i was taken aback when you said he was a hero. i would like you to explain because i'm not sure exactly how you meant that. and then movies. which one do you think most accurately portrays the northfield raid?

>> okay, sure. he's not a hero to me now. he was a childhood hero and i think obviously jesse the qualities that made him or that i saw as heroic was the myth. he grew to become a robin hood and we put adjectives on him that he did not really have. he never gave to the poor. he gave to himself but shortly after he was killed the song was created where robert ford is the coward. he shot jesse in the back and there were novels in the movies that came out. jesse has been transformed and the superman that fought the railroad like the real words -- railroads were the enemy and they mean bankers were going take the house because of the mortgage payment and that's a story you see over and over again. that is why he was a hero and

there are people that still look up to jesse today that are out there but the real jesse and again one of the reasons why wanted to revisit the subject. i wanted to see the real jesse james in what he was like anne frank and the gang members themselves. he is very different than the legend of robin hood. as far as movies there have been several and i think it's a really good thing to bring up. several movies have featured the northfield raid and almost always in these movies they show the northfield raid as a trap and that the people know ahead of time. what that tells me is people might find it hard to believe that this group of criminals could be defeated by everyday citizens to it's got be a trap. that's exactly the way it happened. my favorite jesse james movie is the assassination of jesse james starring brad pitt.

i think it's very accurate except for the aspen trees. it was found in canada but it's a beautiful sound and i think brad pitt is the best jesse james i have ever seen on film. tyrone powers is great and robert wegner is great. robert duval is a good jesse but the best characterization of in my opinion is greg pitt -- brad pitt. >> if any of. >> if any of the outlaws have any descendents and my second question is if you fire you can pull off six shots so how have we were these men armed and did they have several revolvers on them and what type? >> so as far as descendents yes there are descendents of the james family. both frank and jesse have children. jesse left two children a boy and girl and frank had a son robert franklin james.

the younger brothers did not have any children but they had nieces and so there are tangential offshoots from the younger family that are still out there. i was actually contacted recently by a relative of till chadwell and he had a photograph that he was always wondered if he'll chadwell was related. turns out this ancestor was the brother of bill chadwell named jim sir -- jimmer james chadwell. i ran into all types of people descended from the citizens that fought back as they encountered the gang as they escaped through minnesota. i met a relative of nicholas gustafson. there was a family that encounter the robbers before they were captured in a shootout on the river the thompson family. there were a lot of descendents out there and i get lots and lots of e-mails and i get lots of people with great stories about jesse and frank watered

their horses and a horse trough. a good buddy of mine has a hope that belonged to jesse's horse. yeah. i think it probably is. why would you go to the effort to polish it up and make it presentable? what was the second one? the guns. they did not carry rifles or shotguns. they did not carry shoulder guns but they did have multiple pistols sometimes three or four revolvers to give you as my firepower as possible. that goes back to their days as loesh whackers at in these guys are like calvary. they have multiple revolvers to get off multiple shots. at that time each chamber had to be loaded individually. by 1876 they are used to caring several. their favorite weapons are the top weapons of the day. the cold army revolver and the

smith & wesson russian. the smith & wesson was the perfect weapon for them. the colts -- unlike the colts have had an ejector that was supposed to pop the cartridge out. sometimes they would have both as smith & wesson and a couple of colts. at jesse's death he apparently had a cold and smith & wesson is part of his arsenal but a bunch of revolvers. [inaudible] >> i think they probably did have a shoulder holster type assembly and holsters on their belts as well. and the dead hotties of the robbers and one of the robbers they looked at what was in their pockets and built chadwell his pockets were stuffed with cartridges. they said his pockets were filled with cartridges and he was ready.

he was prepared. >> we were in the pretty last week and they brought the bank there and got almost $60,000 then they dropped other banks. all that money come to did they spend it as fast as they got it? >> they spend it as fast as they got it. it went through their fingers like water. they spend it very quick read. jesse had hardly anything at his death. the family come to his wife and children were pretty much destitute. they had an auction and auctioned off a lot of furnishings in the house overlooking them. he was planning a robbery at his best to replenish some of those funds but you are right. it was a huge hall and jesse probably was involved in that but some of the other youngers and cole might even part of that. we don't know all the identities and in fact it's really difficult to know the makeup of

the gang for each particular robbery until we get to that rocky cup robbery and 1876 when hobbs barry confesses he killed all eight men for the first time and there is solid -- but the gang would be different later as well. i want to thank the st. louis county library in thanks these these -- c-span and i had a great time here tonight. my next book is going to be on teddy teddy roosevelt and the rough riders. [applause] nomar out was for a while. [applause]

more from gary pennsylvania. booktv visited the area with the help of our local cable partner timed warner cable. >> the the lagoon area was formed by a series of pines that were connected back in the late 1920s early 30s and was originally meant to be a state wide world's biggest hatchery. they connected the pines but they ran out of money before they could take it any further. the results today have been the fact that we still have a great natural fish hatchery that is semi-closed to the public because the only transportation back here or by electric powered boats or canoes. the public is sort of limited. consequently it is a fairly natural area with all kinds of animals and birds populating it

all summer long. presque isle is french for almost an island. that's because during the recorded history of the park it was an island. it rode through the financial and became an island. at one point the opening was over a mile across and 20 feet deep. in the 1920s the state turned it into a state park. it was the second state park in the whole state of pennsylvania. valley forge was first and then this part. it wasn't called prescott state park at the time. they originally named at pennsylvania state park. one of the areas i like to talk about and you will see is where the. monument is. at one point it was called crystal bay. crystal point and the. monument was dedicated to

commodore perry after his victory on lake erie. after the battle is where this bay became famous. the little bay produce many deaths and problems because of the severe winter we had and the fact that the typhoid fever was running rampant through and many people died. to get them off of the various ships after their deaths they would sew them into old sales, put their bodies in an ad rocks and so it up and take it over to the part we are going through called graveyard pond. the next place we are going to be visiting his waterworks park, a park given to the city by the commonwealth of pennsylvania to provide a method of bringing

cleaner water to the city because of the typhoid epidemic. there is typhoid all over. it was rampant. part of that has to do with the way the ships were built. as to the sailors coming over from england and france and all over were used to saltwater and all the water they used was carried in big barrels in the ships because they couldn't drink the saltwater. when it hit the great lakes they found they could throw a bucket over and pull up fresh water and that was great. part of the problem developed with typhoid was when the sanitation of the ships -- everyone had a hole in the front of the bow they used to take care of their duties. that was fine because in the ocean in it would be cleaned and go over the side and wash the deck and at the great lakes, that was apparent but when they anchored the ships this

continued but they also were throwing the buckets over the back of the boat to pull up the water. that is when. people the soldiers got typhoid because of the unsanitary conditions. this was happening in the cities. a lot of the cities had sewage treatment plants. they were taking a the water from the bay of the time and taking the water in for water only 100 yards apart so the typhoid was rampant. there were years where 12 of 1400 people died and 40% of the population were sick during that time. that is why this park decided to bring clean or into the city. to bring the water to the city they actually have had to cut the peninsula and have them put a 40-foot wide and 12-foot deep trench all the way across and the dredged the pond first and then they dredged the west pond

next. it took about two years. one of the funny things that happened was they brought a truck load of piping and all of that in on the lake side of this a storm came up in the barge sank and all of the piping was lost and never recovered. they were told before this not to do that because the lake was too treacherous. of course no one listened and it was destroyed. the park today, the two ponds are there. they were used to settle out the dirt -- dirt out of the water and in the water was pumped. what happened over the years is the water settled out and distilled filled the 12 feet and all of a sudden the ponds were 8 feet deep. they have built a building on the sides and they put in a steam-powered pump where they

pumped the water out of the pond's, first date he spawned and cleaned it out and then they decided to cement that pond. the bottom and sides were cemented and they refilled it. once the pond was cleaned out it was never cemented. about 1951 or 1952 they start -- stopped using it to filter the water. they would pump their water underneath into the city to the water plant where they use the chlorination filtration process so they didn't have to settle the water out any longer. ..