Harvey Bailey, The Most Successful Bank Robber Of The 1920s
Wikimedia CommonsHarvey Bailey’s mugshot in 1933.
In the 1920s, there was no bank robber as prolific as Harvey Bailey. In fact, he was even known as the “Dean of American Bank Robbers.” He carried out his first heist in 1921 when he was 34 years old — and he never looked back.
Bailey was arrested in 1932, but on June 1, 1933, he escaped from a Dallas prison by using the warden as a human shield. He was soon captured once again and sentenced to life in prison for his suspected role in Machine Gun Kelly’s kidnapping of oil tycoon Charles Urschel. In September 1934, Bailey was transferred to Alcatraz, which had just opened as a federal penitentiary, because of his history of escaping.
U.S. Department of JusticeHarvey Bailey’s wanted poster from 1933.
An October 1933 article in TIME described the purpose of the new prison: “The plan is to move the more intractable kidnappers, murderers, thieves, and racketeers out of Federal penitentiaries and isolate them on Alcatraz ‘so that their evil influences may not be extended to other prisoners.’ They will not be subjected to ‘unusual or unreasonable environment,’ the Attorney General explained, and only real incorrigibles will be sent there. To Alcatraz will probably go kidnappers Harvey J. Bailey and George (‘Machine Gun’) Kelly to view Golden Gate sunsets for the rest of their natural lives.”
However, Bailey spent only 12 years at Alcatraz, and little is known about his time there. He was transferred to another prison in 1946 and released in 1964 after 30 years behind bars. He lived out the rest of his life in relative peace, dying in Joplin, Missouri, in 1979 at the age of 91.
