Sowers, Texas

Last updated
Sowers, Texas
USA Texas location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Sowers, TX
Location within Texas
Usa edcp location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Sowers, TX
Sowers, TX (the United States)
Coordinates: 32°49′42″N96°59′26″W / 32.82833°N 96.99056°W / 32.82833; -96.99056
Country United States
State Texas
County Dallas
Settled1848
Founded byE. D. Sowers
Elevation
531 ft (162 m)
Population
 (1905)
  Total121
Time zone UTC-6 (CST)
FIPS code 48113
GNIS feature ID1347617

Sowers is a ghost town located approximately 11 miles northwest of Dallas, Texas in Dallas County. Today, the once rural community is located entirely within the boundaries of Irving, Texas. Of the original townsite, only the cemetery remains.

Contents

History

Sowers was settled in the late 1840s and by 1884 had a population of seventy-five and possessed several businesses including a blacksmith, a church, a doctor, a druggist, a school, and two steam gristmill-cotton gins. A post office was established in 1881, it and the town were named after early pioneer E. D. Sowers. The population was listed at 121 residents in 1905 and remained at or near that figure until the 1950s, when the community's last reported population was a mere thirty residents in 1956. Sowers was annexed by Irving soon thereafter. [1] [2]

Attempted Capture of Bonnie and Clyde

Sowers gained notoriety on November 21, 1933, when renowned criminals Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow met family members at dusk near what is now Texas Highway 183 approximately one and a quarter miles northwest of the community, where Barrow had arranged a clandestine picnic to celebrate his mother's fifty-ninth birthday. Since Barrow had not had a gift to present his mother, the pair planned to return the following evening for an extended visit at which time he planned to give her a gift. On November 22, 1933, as Parker and Barrow approached the previous evening's family meeting spot, law enforcement officers Smoot Schmidt, Ted Hinton, Ed Caster, and Bob Alcorn; armed with Thompson submachine guns, .351 "Bullhead" repeating rifle, and BAR (Browning Automatic Rifles) opened a fusillade of gunfire from a ditch about seventy-five feet away. Upon their accelerated escape, several .30 caliber rounds from Bob Alcorn's BAR pierced the driver side door of Clyde's stolen 1933 Ford V-8 five-window coupe wounding both Parker and Barrow with shots to the knees. The pair subsequently abandoned the car and fled. [3] Hinton and Alcorn later participated in the fatal ambush that halted Barrow and Parker's spree on May 23, 1934, near Gibsland, Louisiana.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bonnie and Clyde</span> American bank robbers in the 1930s

Bonnie Elizabeth Parker and Clyde Chestnut "Champion" Barrow were American bandits and serial murderers who traveled the Central United States with their gang during the Great Depression. The couple was known for their bank robberies and multiple murders, although they preferred to rob small stores or rural funeral homes. Their exploits captured the attention of the American press and its readership during what is occasionally referred to as the "public enemy era" between 1931 and 1934. They were ambushed by police and shot to death in Bienville Parish, Louisiana. They are believed to have murdered at least nine police officers and four civilians.

<i>Bonnie and Clyde</i> (film) 1967 American film by Arthur Penn

Bonnie and Clyde is a 1967 American biographical neo-noir crime film directed by Arthur Penn and starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the title characters Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker. The film also features Michael J. Pollard, Gene Hackman, and Estelle Parsons. The screenplay is by David Newman and Robert Benton. Robert Towne and Beatty provided uncredited contributions to the script; Beatty produced the film. The music is by Charles Strouse.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gibsland, Louisiana</span> Town in Louisiana, United States

Gibsland is a town in Bienville Parish in northern Louisiana, United States. As of the 2020 census, its population was 773. The town is best known for its connecting railroads, as the birthplace of the defunct historically black Coleman College, and for the nearby shootings in 1934 of the bandits Bonnie and Clyde.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Okabena, Minnesota</span> City in Minnesota, United States

Okabena is a town in Jackson County, Minnesota, United States. The population was 188 at the 2010 census. The community's name is a Dakota term meaning "the nesting place of herons."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ponder, Texas</span> Town in Texas, United States

Ponder is a town in Denton County, Texas, United States. The population was 2,442 in 2020.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Telico, Texas</span> Unincorporated community in Texas, US

Telico is an unincorporated community in northeastern Ellis County, Texas, United States, on Highway 34.

Sparkman-Hillcrest Memorial Park Cemetery is a multi-faith cemetery located at 7405 West Northwest Highway in North Dallas, Texas, United States. It is owned by Service Corporation International. Among the notable persons interred here are:

Raymond Elzie Hamilton was a member of the notorious Barrow Gang during the early 1930s. By the time he was 20 years old, he had accumulated a prison sentence of 362 years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Hamer</span> American law enforcement officer

Francis Augustus Hamer was an American lawman and Texas Ranger who led the 1934 posse that tracked down and killed criminals Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. Renowned for his toughness, marksmanship, and investigative skill, he acquired status in the Southwest as the archetypal Texas Ranger. He was inducted into the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame. His professional record and reputation are controversial, particularly with regard to his willingness to use extrajudicial killing even in an increasingly modernized society.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">W. D. Jones</span> Member of the Bonnie and Clyde Barrow Gang

William Daniel Jones was a member of the Barrow Gang, whose crime spree throughout the southern Midwest in the early years of the Great Depression became part of American criminal folklore. Jones ran with Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker for eight and a half months, from Christmas Eve 1932 to early September 1933. He and another gang member named Henry Methvin were consolidated into the "C.W. Moss" character in the film Bonnie and Clyde (1967). Of the character C.W. Moss in the movie, Jones said: "Moss was a dumb kid who run errands and done what Clyde told him. That was me, all right."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Buck Barrow</span> Brother of infamous Clyde Barrow

Marvin Ivan "Buck" Barrow was a member of the Barrow Gang. He was the older brother of the gang's leader, Clyde Barrow. He and his wife, Blanche, were wounded in a gun battle with police four months after they joined up with Bonnie and Clyde. Buck died of his injuries soon afterward.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blanche Barrow</span> Member of "Bonnie and Clyde" gang

Blanche Barrow was the wife of the elder brother of Clyde Barrow, known as Buck. He became her second husband after his release from prison after a pardon. To her dismay, Buck joined his brother's gang. Blanche was present at the shootout which resulted in the Barrow Gang becoming nationally recognized fugitives. She spent only four months with the gang.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holt Coffey</span> American politician

Holt Coffey was the sheriff of Platte County, Missouri from 1933 until 1937 and again from 1941 until 1945. Coffey, along with newly elected Platte City Prosecutor David Clevenger, was responsible for cleaning up much of the small-time crime around Platte County, a suburb of freewheeling Kansas City, Missouri.

The Red Crown Tavern and Red Crown Tourist Court in Platte County, Missouri was the site of the July 20, 1933 gun battle between lawmen and outlaws Bonnie and Clyde and three members of their gang. The outlaws made their escape, and were tracked down and cornered four days later near Dexter, Iowa and engaged by another posse. The shootout was depicted in Arthur Penn's 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde, though the sign on the motel in the movie reads "Platte City, Iowa," not Missouri.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ted Hinton</span> American peace officer (1904–1977)

Ted Cass Hinton was a Dallas County, Texas, deputy sheriff, the youngest of the posse that ambushed and killed Bonnie and Clyde near Gibsland, Louisiana, on May 23, 1934.

Ralph Fults was a Depression-era outlaw and escape artist associated with Raymond Hamilton, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow of the Barrow Gang.

The Barrow Gang was an American gang active between 1932 and 1934. They were well known outlaws, robbers, murderers, and criminals who, as a gang, traveled the Central United States during the Great Depression. Their exploits were known all over the nation. They captured the attention of the American press and its readership during what is sometimes referred to as the 'public enemy era'. Though the gang was notorious for the bank robberies they committed, they preferred to rob small stores or gas stations over banks. The gang was believed to have killed at least nine police officers, among several other murders.

The Newton Gang was an outlaw gang of the early 20th century, who engaged in train robbery and bank robbery. From 1919 through 1924 the gang robbed dozens of banks, claiming a total of seventy-five banks and six trains. According to Willis Newton, the brothers "took in more money than the Dalton Gang, Butch Cassidy's Wild Bunch and the James-Younger Gang combined." According to their own claims, they never killed anyone although it has been reported that "they did on occasion shoot, pistol-whip and beat their victims"

Ledbetter/Eagle Ford is a neighborhood in West Dallas, Texas, United States.

<i>The Highwaymen</i> (film) 2019 film directed by John Lee Hancock

The Highwaymen is a 2019 American period crime thriller film directed by John Lee Hancock and written by John Fusco. The film stars Kevin Costner and Woody Harrelson as Frank Hamer and Maney Gault, two former Texas Rangers who attempt to track down and apprehend notorious criminals Bonnie and Clyde in the 1930s. Kathy Bates, John Carroll Lynch, Kim Dickens, Thomas Mann and William Sadler also star.

References

  1. Maxwell, Lisa C. "Sowers, Texas". Handbook of Texas Online - Texas State Historical Association. Retrieved 28 March 2012.
  2. Sowers Community, 3201 West Pioneer Irving, Texas : Texas marker #13736 -
  3. Guinn, Jeff (March 9, 2010). "Go Down Together: The True, Untold Story of Bonnie and Clyde". Simon & Schuster. pp. 238–241. ISBN   978-1416557074.{{cite web}}: Missing or empty |url= (help)
Bibliography