Texas | Columns

Crimes & Outlaws

• Murder at a school by Bob Bowman 10-13-08
  During the evening of March 12, 1926, as students and parents watched a play at Center Point school in Trinity County, two brothers, Frank and Harvey Johnson, rushed through the main door...
  
  
• The Mystery of Lady Bountiful by Bob Bowman 11-5-07
  November 22 will mark the 85th anniversary of an East Texas murder that created a still-lingering mystery and put a timber baroness in a pauper’s grave.
  
  
• Pistol-packing Preacher by Bob Bowman 5-14-07
  On his first morning in Groveton Lee presided at the funeral of a young church member who had been murdered. He soon named criminals from his pulpit and where they gathered.
  
  
• Looking for Hangings by Bob Bowman 4-16-07
  
  
• The Circus Fight by Bob Bowman 12/24/06
  "What one historian has called "the most famous circus fight in history" unfolded in 1873 as Robinson's Circus was preparing to leave Jacksonville in East Texas..."
  
  
• Outlaw with two faces by Bob Bowman 2/05
  Pete Loggins/Rupert P. Wright
  
  
• Bill Longley: Down and Out in a Nacogdoches Jail by Archie P. McDonald 12-7-04
  
  
• Poisoned Supper by Bob Bowman 10/25/04
  A tragic, unthinkable incident in the spring of 1847, frequently associated with the Regulator-Moderator War, remains after 157 years one of East Texas’ worst mass murders -- if it was murder.
  
  
• A Railroad Holdup by Bob Bowman 9/28/04
  Railroaders love to tell stories, and the one they relish the most is about the railroad president and the holdup man.
  
  
• A Famous Murder by Bob Bowman 11/03
  80th anniversary of one of East Texas' most famous mysteries
  
  
• Courtroom Storytellers by Bob Bowman 9/03
  Because they've seen the best and worst of humanity, lawyers are among our best storytellers. Courtroom stories of Joe Tonahill and J.J. Collins.
  
  
• Looking for Old Murders by Bob Bowman 7/03
  Between the 1860s and 1940s, East Texas produced some of the strangest murders in Texas.
  
  
• The Barrymore Shooting by Bob Bowman 6/03
  Someone asked John Barrymore, the patriarch of America's famous family of thespians, what he thought about Texas. In his deep, resonant voice, Barrymore replied: "Texas is a no man's land where sudden death lurks in every bistro." He had good reason for feeling that way.
  
  
• The Bank Robbery, the Dalton Gang, 1894 by Bob Bowman 5/21/02

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