Taking down outlaws
The Washington Times: February 22, 2005

Address:http://www.washtimes.com/culture/20050221-113353-7501r.htm

By Amy Doolittle
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

In Hollywood, outlaws are either gunned down by lawmen, like Gary
Cooper’s character in “High Noon,” or are portrayed as anti-heroes, like
Robert Redford and Paul Newman’s characters in “Butch Cassidy and the
Sundance Kid.” But in the real world, the bad guys are truly wicked, say
brothers John and Robert Waters, and the sheriff isn’t always around to
stop them. In fact, some of the most notorious outlaws in history were
killed or captured by ordinary citizens.

“You see all these movies and stuff about the heroic sheriff
who runs the outlaws out of town, but you don’t see a lot about the
ordinary citizen defending themselves in their towns,” said Robert
Waters. “I wondered what really happened, so I began researching it and
found in American history there were numerous accounts of [such]
stories. I thought it was important [to tell them] because they had not
been told.”

In their new book, “Outgunned: True Stories of Citizens Who
Stood Up to Outlaws and Won,” the Waters brothers collected accounts of
ordinary people taking down the bad men. Among the stories related in
the book:

? Notorious outlaw Henry Starr was captured after a bank
robbery in Stroud, Okla., after being shot by 17-year-old Paul Curry,
using the sawed-off .30-.30 rifle the Curry family kept for slaughtering
hogs.

? “Black Jack” Ketchum, a killer, robber and cattle
rustler who once hid out with Butch Cassidy’s gang, was captured after
trying to rob a train in New Mexico. Frank Harrington, the conductor on
the train, foiled Ketchum’s plan by shooting him with a 10-gauge
shotgun.

? After a botched robbery attempt in Midland, Mich., the
robbers’ escape was thwarted by a dentist. Dr. Frank Hardy, an avid
hunter who kept a .35-caliber rifle in his office above the bank, shot
and wounded robber Anthony Chebatoris as he drove away, causing him to
wreck the getaway car. Chebatoris’ partner, Jack Gracy, then attempted
to escape by hijacking a truck but was shot through the head by Dr.
Hardy at a range of nearly 200 yards.

? George Birdwell, a member of the “Pretty Boy” Floyd
gang, thought the Farmers & Merchants Bank in the all-black town of
Boley, Okla., would be easy pickings. But Birdwell and two partners made
the mistake of trying to rob the bank on the opening day of hunting
season in 1932, when the town was filled with armed black farmers.
Birdwell was fatally shot by the bank’s bookkeeper, and dozens of
townsmen opened fire on his accomplices as they tried to escape, killing
one and wounding and capturing the other.

Most Americans aren’t aware of these stories, Robert Waters
said, because of political correctness: We have been taught that guns
are evil and used so often for wrong, he said, we forget that they can
also be used for right.

But now there is a growing awareness of the positive value
of firearms, he said.

“In the past few years, stories of people defending
themselves with firearms have come out over the Internet and talk radio
and occasionally in the mainstream media,” he said. “The perspective of
Americans has changed and people realize that guns are basically a tool.
They can be used for evil and can be used for good.”

This shift was evidenced, he said, in the 2004 presidential
election. Democrats, who traditionally support firearm restrictions,
“would not touch the anti-gun issue with a 10-foot pole,” he said. “Even
[Democratic candidate Sen.] John Kerry pretended to be a hunter in order
to get the people who were in favor of guns to vote for him.”

One problem with Americans’ perspective on crime and guns,
Mr. Waters said, is that popular culture sometimes celebrates criminals
as heroic — a view that has a long history.

“A deep populist strain has always existed in middle
America, an ingrained suspicion of those in authority and those who
control vast amounts of wealth,” he and his brother explain in their
book.

“Instilled in this mentality is an inclination to root for
the underdog. Those who looked on criminals as heroes admired the outlaw
as an individualist who followed his own path.”

The sympathetic portrayal of criminals as underdogs is very
widespread in contemporary Hollywood, said Ted Baehr, chairman of the
Christian Film and Television Commission.

“For many years during the golden age of Hollywood when Mr.
Smith went to Washington, you had positive heroes and good guys who wore
white hats,” he said, but that changed in the late 1960s, a period that
“produced the anti-hero.”

But that doesn’t mean that there are no real heroes in
theaters, Mr. Baehr said.

“The good news is that since 1985 there has been an increase
in the good guys who wear white hats,” he said.

But, Mr. Baehr warns, the anti-hero will always have some
residence in the artistic community. Robert Waters said this is probably
because Americans find criminals interesting and different — a
perspective he said that overlooks the heroism of law-abiding citizens.

“Criminals are fascinating, but on the other hand, I find
the ordinary citizen to be very fascinating,” Mr. Waters said. “What
would draw someone to pick up a gun and defend another citizen and
defend their town when the bank is being robbed? Maybe they’re not
heroic in the eyes of Hollywood, but I think they are heroes.”