The Great Train Robbery was the robbery of £2.6 million from a Royal Mail train heading from Glasgow to London on the West Coast Main Line in the early hours of 8 August 1963 at Bridego Railway Bridge, Ledburn, near Mentmore in Buckinghamshire, England.
Contract killing is a form of murder or assassination in which one party hires another party to kill a targeted person or persons. It involves an illegal agreement which includes some form of payment, monetary or otherwise. Either party may be a person, group, or organization. Contract killing has been associated with organized crime, government conspiracies, dictatorships, and vendettas. For example, in the United States, the Jewish-American organized crime gang Murder, Inc. committed hundreds of murders on behalf of the National Crime Syndicate during the 1930s and '40s.
The Untouchables is an American crime drama produced by Desilu Productions that ran from 1959 to 1963 on the ABC Television Network. Based on the memoir of the same name by Eliot Ness and Oscar Fraley, it fictionalized experiences of Elliot Ness as a Prohibition agent, fighting crime in Chicago in the 1930s with the help of a special team of agents handpicked for their courage, moral character, and incorruptibility, nicknamed the Untouchables. The book was later made into a celebrated film in 1987 by Brian De Palma, with a script by David Mamet, and a second, less-successful TV series in 1993.
Kate Barker, better known as Ma Barker, was the mother of several American criminals who ran the Barker-Karpis gang during the "public enemy era" when the exploits of gangs of criminals in the Midwest gripped the American people and press. She traveled with her sons during their criminal careers.
Alvin Francis Karpis, a Depression-era gangster nicknamed "Creepy" for his sinister smile and called "Ray" by his gang members, was a Canadian-born criminal of Lithuanian descent known for being a leader of the Barker–Karpis gang in the 1930s. Karpis led the gang along with Fred Barker and Arthur "Doc" Barker. There were only four "public enemies" ever given the title of "Public Enemy #1" by the FBI and he was the only one to be taken alive. The other three, John Dillinger, Pretty Boy Floyd, and Baby Face Nelson, were all killed before being captured. He also spent the longest time as a federal prisoner at Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, serving twenty-six years.
Carmine Falcone is a fictional character in DC Comics, portrayed as a powerful mob boss, an enemy of Batman, and a friend of the Wayne family. He has also been depicted in some versions as the illegitimate father of Catwoman.
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.
Edward James "Eddie" Adams was a notorious American criminal and spree killer in the Midwest. He murdered seven people–including three policemen—over a period of around 14 months, and wounded at least a dozen others. At age 34, Adams was surrounded and then killed by police in Wichita, Kansas.
Egan's Rats was an American organized crime gang that exercised considerable power in St. Louis, Missouri, from 1890 to 1924. Its 35 years of criminal activity included bootlegging, labor slugging, voter intimidation, armed robbery, and murder. Although predominantly Irish-American, Egan's Rats did include a few Italian-Americans and some Jewish immigrants, most notably Max "Big Maxie" Greenberg.
White Heat is a 1949 American film noir directed by Raoul Walsh and starring James Cagney, Virginia Mayo, Edmond O'Brien, Margaret Wycherly and Steve Cochran. Written by Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts, White Heat is based on a story by Virginia Kellogg, and is considered to be one of the best gangster movies of all time. In 2003, it was added to the National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress.
The Grissom Gang is a 1971 American crime neo noir directed and produced by Robert Aldrich from a screenplay by Leon Griffiths. The film is the second adaptation of the 1939 novel No Orchids for Miss Blandish by James Hadley Chase; a previous version had been made in Britain in 1948. The cast includes Kim Darby, Scott Wilson, Tony Musante, Robert Lansing, Irene Dailey, Connie Stevens, Wesley Addy, Joey Faye and Ralph Waite.
The Bottoms Gang was an American street gang that terrorized St. Louis, Missouri in the early 20th century. Their main criminal activities included voter intimidation, armed robbery, assault, illegal lottery, and murder. The gang's members were primarily Irish-American, with a handful of German and Missouri Creole hoodlums sprinkled in their ranks. The ferocious Bottoms Gang had a meteoric rise and fall in St. Louis's underworld. They feuded with the larger Egan's Rats gang and became notorious for going out of their way to attack members of the St. Louis Police Department. They made up for their lack of numbers with frenzied brutality and reckless nerve. Crippled by arrests and murders, the Bottoms Gang had ceased to exist by the time America entered World War I.
Lawrence DeVol was an American criminal, bank robber, prison escapee and Depression-era outlaw. He was connected to several Midwestern gangs during the 1920s and 1930s, most often with the Barker-Alvin Karpis and Holden-Keating Gangs, and was also a former partner of Harvey Bailey early in his criminal career. DeVol is known to have killed at least eleven people during his criminal career, including six law enforcement officers.
Frederick George Barker was an American criminal who, along with Alvin Karpis, co-founded the Barker-Karpis gang, which committed numerous robberies, murders and kidnappings during the 1930s. Barker was the youngest son of Ma Barker, all of whose children were criminals. He was killed in a lengthy gunfight with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in 1935.
Wilbur Underhill Jr., often called "Mad Dog" or the "Tri-State Terror", was an American criminal, burglar, bank robber and Depression-era outlaw. He was one of the most wanted bandits in Oklahoma during the 1920s and 1930s and co-led a gang with Harvey Bailey that included many fellow Cookson Hills outlaws including Jim Clark, Ed Davis and Robert "Big Bob" Brady.
Queen of the Mob is a 1940 American film, directed by James P. Hogan.
Smart Blonde is a 1937 American mystery film directed by Frank McDonald. Starring Glenda Farrell as Torchy Blane, a fast-talking wisecracking female reporter, teaming up with her boyfriend detective Steve McBride, to solve the killing of an investor who just bought a popular local nightclub. The first of nine Torchy Blane films by Warner Bros, it was released on January 2, 1937. The film is followed by Fly-Away Baby (1937).
The Barker–Karpis Gang was one of the longest-lived criminal gangs during the Depression Era, spanning from 1931 to 1935. The gang was founded by Fred Barker and Alvin Karpis, and later joined by Fred's brother Arthur "Doc" Barker. Along with the three core members, the gang's network spanned up to 25 members at one point.
Thomas Archibald Brown, known as "Big Tom", was the mobbed-up police chief of St. Paul, Minnesota during the Great Depression.
