Just before the pair was gunned down, Hamilton had split from the gang after a dispute over his girlfriend. Hamilton was apprehended and sent to the Texas State Penitentiary at Huntsville. He was sentenced to death and electrocuted a year later -- his last words being, "Well, goodbye all."
As a result of the Hamilton and O'Darr incident, the Midland County sheriff deputize several local businessmen in the "business district to thwart any [future] attempt to rob the bank," according to Margaret Leaming, author of an article about the bank robbery. One of those deputized was Dr. Frank Hardy, who was told to keep a loaded deer rifle in his office on the second floor of a mattress and furniture store next to the bank.
On September 29, 1937, two ex-cons, Jack Gracey (28) and Tony Chebatoris (37), walked onto the scene. The two men, who had met in prison, had spent several days casing the bank.
The duo entered the bank shortly before noon. According to Leaming, they entered the bank without
Hamilton was a boyhood buddy of Clyde Barrow, and the pair was implicated in the murder of Oklahoma Deputy Sheriff Eugene Moore -- the first peace officer killed by the pair. Hamilton was subsequently arrested and extradited to Texas. According to Dave Rogers, a local historian in nearby Bay City, MI, Bonnie and Clyde "sprang Hamilton from a prison work gang in [January] 1934, and the trio set off on a cross-country crime spree."
In the process of "springing" Hamilton and four other inmates, Bonnie and Clyde killed a prison guard, causing Texas authorities to plan extraordinary actions for their demise. Bonnie and Clyde were mowed down five months later in May 1934 in Louisiana by Texas rangers. Their love affair, crime spree, and bloody ending were memorialized in the 1967 hit movie Bonnie and Clyde, starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway.
February 18, 2014 -- Bonnie and Clyde, Machine Gun Kelley, Baby Face Nelson, and Frank Dillinger -- all part of an era in American history when notorious bank robbers were more or less glorified by the nation's press. But there was really nothing to glorify about them. They were all stone-hearted killers.
It was in this social environment that Frank Hardy, DDS, "a sharpshooting, mild-mannered dentist," found himself on September 29, 1937, in Midland, MI.
Dr. Hardy was born in Midland in 1890, the second of three boys. His father was a lumberman. Dr. Hardy graduated from the University of Michigan School of Dentistry in 1912 with honors and married Laura, his childhood sweetheart. The couple had no children. He was a veteran of World War I and active in Midland social clubs. He practiced dentistry from 1913 until he died of pneumonia in 1947 at the age of 57.
The story begins in 1932 when the sheriff of Midland County apprehended Ray Hamilton (age 19) and Jean O'Darr (age 22). The two men had gotten off a bus from Chicago to case and rob the Chemical State Savings Bank in Midland.
At the time, it was common knowledge that the bank received a $75,000 cash shipment ($1.3 million in 2014 dollars) every two weeks for the nearby Dow Chemical Plant payroll. At the time, most payrolls were disbursed in cash to workers.
Hamilton was a boyhood buddy of Clyde Barrow, and the pair was implicated in the murder of Oklahoma Deputy Sheriff Eugene Moore -- the first peace officer killed by the pair. Hamilton was subsequently arrested and extradited to Texas. According to Dave Rogers, a local historian in nearby Bay City, MI, Bonnie and Clyde "sprang Hamilton from a prison work gang in [January] 1934, and the trio set off on a cross-country crime spree."
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By Daniel Demers, DrBicuspid.com contributing writer
Continued Page 2
Courtesy of:
Dr. Frank Hardy: The sharpshooting dentist
Frank Hardy, DDS.
E-MAIL ME ddemers901@sonic.net