Barker, Arizona Clark "Kate" Or "Ma" 1871-1935

BARKER, ARIZONA CLARK "KATE" OR "MA" 1871-1935

"Ma" and Her "Boys."

As a historical figure, "Ma" Barker is something of a puzzle. Never arrested for committing a crime, she was nevertheless suspected of being the leader of a gang J. Edgar Hoover considered one of the most vicious with whom the FBI ever had to contend. The public, feeding on newsprint that detailed the escapades of her "boys" and their friends, perceived her as a mother whose love for her children was so extreme as to have twisted both her conscience and her judgment. To the members of the gang, or so those who survived would later relate, she was no more than a dowdy and simple-minded, middle-aged woman whose use to them was limited to her willingness to hide them from the law and doing what she could to raise bail money or otherwise to secure their release on parole. What, then, was the truth?

Background

In an era famous for its bandits, shoot-outs, and chases, Arizona Clark Barker was a rarity, a female bandit leader. She had been born and raised in Springfield, Missouri, where as a child she had once seen the legendary Jesse James. In 1892, already displaying the dowdiness and plumpness that were to become her hall-mark, she married farm laborer George Barker, who, like her, seemed to be resigned to a life of poverty. What is known about her married life is that it was hard, unhappy, and taken up with the raising of her four sons, Herman, Lloyd, Arthur (who was called "Doc"), and Fred. Her loyalty to her children and the fierceness with which she protected them from the consequences of their delinquent behavior became something of a legend itself in the Ozark Hills in which they lived.

Herman Barker

In the 1920s she could no longer shield her sons from the law and the punishment meted out for their increasingly serious offenses. Doc was arrested in Oklahoma for killing a night watchman during a bungled burglary and sentenced to life imprisonment. In 1927 Herman was stopped by two officers outside of Wichita, Kansas, for questioning in connection with a recent robbery. Pulling his gun, he shot one of the policemen in the head and was shot, in turn, by the other. Badly wounded and fearing capture, Herman killed himself. Ma Barker grieved for weeks afterward.

The Barker Boys

Struggling to find some motive for Mas criminal activities, the FBI later explained that the death of her eldest child drove her into a vengeance-seeking orgy of violence. She was reputed to have carried out a series of bank robberies and kidnappings unequaled in the annals of modern crime. The truth may well have been quite different, but by then it hardly mattered. After the death of Herman, little more was heard concerning the Barkers until 1932, the year Lloyd was arrested for mail robbery and sentenced to a twenty-five-year term. Fred had been serving a term in prison for the shooting of a town constable who had caught him attempting to steal a car. In 1933, under conditions that suggested his freedom may have been purchased, Fred was released and returned home to Ma in the company of Alvin "Creepy" Karpis. It is likely that Fred was the first of the two Barker brothers to form an alliance with Karpis, who quickly became one of Ma's favorites. This was a time when membership in the gang was in steady flux, and Ma provided shelter to several wanted men, including Frank Nash. There was no evidence to show that she had ever participated in the gang's robberies or that the FBI suspected her of being its leader. That would come later.

Kidnapping

In a move that gave J. Edgar Hoover fits, the state of Oklahoma pardoned Doc, who promptly rejoined the gang and assumed, with Karpis, a leadership role. Shortly after Doc's return, Ma's paramour, Arthur Dunlop, whom the gang suspected of being an informant, was killed. A year later, in 1934, the gang gunned down one of its own members, an act that ultimately led to their destruction. In 1933 George Ziegler, World War I veteran, college graduate, engineer, and a Capone gunman, had joined the gang. Ziegler, who had connections throughout the Great Lakes region, was said to have been the first to suggest the gang try its hand at kidnapping. The gang's first target was the Minneapolis banker Edward Bremer, for whom they received a two-hundred-thousand-dollar ransom. But it would appear that the Barker-Karpis gang had already gained some previous experience in the field, having, with the assistance of a local crime boss, abducted the founder of Minneapolis's largest brewery, William Hamm, just six months before. Following the second kidnapping and ransom payment, Ziegler, who had been responsible for the two kidnappings which had so shocked the nation, revealed the gang's participation to friends. He had to be silenced immediately. He was killed in Cicero, Illinois, on 22 March 1934.

Shootout

While the FBI was looking through Ziegler's personal effects and tracing the leads they provided, Ma was dispatched to see Ziegler's widow, whom she convinced to turn over the money concealed by her late husband. Returning to the gang's hideout, Ma discovered the place in an uproar: the FBI was closing in and the gang would have to scatter. Ma's days of handing payoffs to officials and running other errands in complete anonymity were over. The FBI had decided that she had been the brains behind the gang's activities, and, whether she had earned the reputation or not, she was stuck with it. In January 1935 Doc was apprehended by the special agent in charge of the FBI's Chicago field office, Melvyn Purvis. Eight days after Doc's arrest Fred was located in a rented cottage near Lake Weir, Florida. The house was quickly surrounded, and at the end of a four-hour gun battle both Ma and Fred were found dead, a Thompson submachine gun lying between their bodies. The mystery of Ma's place in the gang was never solved, but the story of her death took a permanent place in the bandit lore of the day.