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In Search of Bonnie and Clyde
Places in or near Dallas, Texas associated with the Barrow Gang
SEE ALSO: IN SEARCH OF THE BONNIE AND CLYDE MOVIE and IN SEARCH OF BONNIE AND CLYDE IN LOUISIANA
Is this the death car?
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Although they covered a lot of territory during their two-year-long crime spree (1932-1934), Dallas, Texas was Bonnie and Clyde's hometown and they returned often, usually to visit relatives. Occasionally, they also ran afoul of the law while in town. Not surprisingly, there are a number of places in or near Dallas with which they are associated and some can still be seen. Be aware: Some of the sites listed below are still being used as private residences or businesses and may not be entered without the owner's permission. Please note: The author of this web site does not purport to be a Bonnie and Clyde expert. Any email questions about the infamous lovers are unlikely to be answered. If you want or need more information about the ill-starred couple, you would probably be better off reading one or more of these books about Bonnie and Clyde |
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Denton Road, between Bachman Dam and "Five Point Dancehall" (exact location unknown, probably north of Northwest Highway) - Bonnie and Clyde picked up W. D. Jones here on June 9, 1933, after "losing" him for six weeks following the brief kidnapping of H. D. Darby and Sophie Stone at Ruston, Louisiana - an incident that was dramatized in the Warren Beatty-Faye Dunaway movie, with the names of the kidnapped couple, portrayed by Gene Wilder and Evans Evans, changed to Eugene Grizzard and Velma Davis. |
| Crown Hill Cemetery, northeast corner of Lombardy Lane and Webb Chapel Road - Bonnie, along with the remains of sister Billie's two children, was moved here from Fishtrap Cemetery, in West Dallas, in 1945. Bonnie's mother Emma Parker was also buried here, following her death in 1946. Only Bonnie has a marker. Ironically, the inscription on it reads: As the flowers are all made sweeter by the sunshine and the dew, so this old world is made brighter by the lives of folks like you. | |
| Sparkman-Hillcrest Cemetery, on north side of Northwest Highway, west of Northpark Shopping Center and Hwy. 75-Central Expressway - Ted Hinton was a Dallas County deputy sheriff and one of the six lawmen who killed Bonnie and Clyde in a hail of gunfire in Louisiana on May 23, 1934. In his book Ambush, published two years after his death in 1977, Hinton claimed that he and the other five officers broke the law themselves in order to stop Bonnie and Clyde, by kidnapping Henry Methvin's father and forcing him to participate in the ambush. Although all writers agree that Methvin made a deal with Texas law enforcement officers in order to obtain a pardon for his son, Hinton says it was not made in advance, as commonly believed, but rather after the fact, to keep Methvin from telling the FBI what really happened. Remarkably, few (if any) modern writers have included this information in their books, continuing to perpetuate the original, and possibly inaccurate, version of the ambush, in which Methvin is portrayed as a willing participant (as also in the 1967 movie). |
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Around 1932, Mrs. Emma Parker, Bonnie's mother, resided in the Oak Lawn area of Dallas at an address near the present-day Dallas North Tollway. It was from this address that Bonnie departed to begin her two-year-long life of crime with Clyde Barrow. The actual address has not been included here because it is possible the house is still in use as a private residence. |
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Hargraves' Cafe (now Evans Grinding Co.), 3308 Swiss Circle (southeast corner of Swiss Ave. and Hall Street, adjoining Wilson Historic District, near Baylor Hospital) - Bonnie reportedly worked here from January 1928 through spring 1929, when she was in her late teens. It is said that at lunch time she stood at the back door of the cafe, which opens on to Floyd Street, taking orders from harried workers in a laundry who shouted to her from across the street. After Hargraves closed, Bonnie found work at Marco's Cafe, 702 Main Street, near the county courthouse. According to former Dallas County deputy sheriff Ted Hinton (now deceased), Bonnie also waited tables for a period of time at the Texan Cafe (in his book Ambush Hinton misidentified it as the "American Cafe"), 210 S. Houston Street, also near the courthouse. Neither Marco's or the Texan Cafe are extant. |
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Belo Mansion/Dallas Law Center, Ross Avenue - Former home of Col. Belo (founder of Dallas Morning News), this once fashionable Ross Avenue residence later became the mortuary where Clyde's body was laid out for public viewing prior to his funeral. During the circus-like atmosphere that prevailed, approximately 20,000 Dallasites filed past the bier to view his bullet-riddled corpse. His funeral was held here Friday, May 25, 1934. He was buried next to his brother Buck in Western Heights Cemetery in West Dallas. |
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Dallas County Criminal Court and Jail Bldg., at Dealey Plaza, northeast corner of Houston and Main streets (diagonally across the street from "Old Red" Courthouse) - Constructed in 1913. It was out of this building that Dallas County Sheriff "Smoot" Schmid, along with deputies Ted Hinton and Bob Alcorn operated in the early 1930s, trying to put a stop to the crime spree of Bonnie and Clyde. Various members of the Barrow Gang, including W. D. Jones and Raymond Hamilton, were incarcerated here at one time or another. |
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Around 1925-26, when he was a teenager, Clyde Barrow held a job for a period of time at the A. & K. Auto Top and Paint Works, located at 2604 S. Main Street, corner of Main and Lloyd, the latter a street that no longer exists. Apparently, this business was located in a two or three block long section of Main Street buildings that were demolished several years ago to make way for the Julius Schepps Freeway overpass, which now divides Downtown Dallas from the eclectic area known as "Deep Ellum." Between 1926 and 1928, Clyde Barrow worked at the United Mirror and Glass Company, 2606 Swiss Avenue, south side of Swiss between Good (now Good-Latimer) and Cantegral, about a block west of the present-day Wilson Historic District. The address no longer exists but there is a one story building on the site. Whether the structure is of more recent construction or if only the exterior has been changed is uncertain. In either event, there is no question that the site does not appear today as it did in the late 1920s. In 1932 Clyde Barrow robbed the Neuhoff Meat Packing Plant, which was then located on Alamo Street, immediately north of and adjoining Downtown Dallas. It is uncertain whether this building is still standing or not. |
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Although Bonnie Parker grew up in West Dallas - near Cement City, her widowed mother, Emma, moved to South Dallas sometime after 1927. When Bonnie's marriage to Roy Thornton began to fail about 1928, she went to live with her mother and brother Hubert or "Buster," staying until she left in 1932 to embark upon a life of crime with Clyde Barrow. For a period of time the Parker household also consisted of Bonnie's sister Billie and her husband Fred Mace. The family resided at three known addresses in this area during the late 1920s and early 1930s. These were:
Clyde Barrow also has connections to South Dallas. For a period time in the 1920s, his sister Nell lived on Pear Street (address unknown) and he visited her there from time to time. Also, in 1925, before he met Bonnie, Clyde dated a girl named "Anne B.," a student at Forest Avenue (now James Madison) High School, which was (is) located on Forest Avenue (now Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.). Clyde hoped to marry the girl after she was graduated but the relationship came to an end after he stole a car and Anne's parents forbade her to see him anymore. Clyde also held jobs in South Dallas around this time, with Proctor and Gamble at 1226 Loomis Street and the Nu-Grape Bottling Company, 1719-23 South Ervay. Whether or not the buildings these businesses occupied are still standing is uncertain. |
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During the 1920s and '30s, West Dallas was known as "Little Cicero" due to its associaton with Bonnie and Clyde, the Hamilton brothers - Ray and Floyd, and scores of lesser known criminals. Never one of the more attractive parts of Dallas, it remains today a poverty-stricken area consisting of industrial buildings and many of the same modest wooden frame dwellings that were there when Bonnie and Clyde called this part of Dallas "home." Bonnie's family moved here in 1914, after her father died in Runnels County, Texas, where she was born in 1911. They lived with Bonnie's maternal grandparents, Frank and Mary Krause, in a rural area near Cement City - a neighborhood adjacent to the Trinity Portland Cement Company. Clyde's family came to West Dallas much later, in 1922. After Bonnie and Roy Thornton were married on Sept. 24, 1926, they also lived in West Dallas until they separated in 1928. At that time, Bonnie went to live with her mother, who had moved to South Dallas (and also lived for about a year in the Oak Lawn section of town).
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