"I rob banks for a living. What do you do?"

My second vintage criminal is bank-robbin' bad boy, John Dillinger. Dillinger's audacity and colorful personality made him a stand out and public favorite in the same era as such notorious criminals as Bonnie and Clyde and George "Machine Gun Kelly" Barnes.  To me, Dillinger fits snugly between the "gentleman" thief and the Depression-era criminal who many people were overjoyed to see sticking up the very banks that were repossessing their homes and belongings.  Over the years, he's become a pop-culture staple being played in films a dozen different times, and has become more of a romantic figure than a violent criminal.  As I mentioned in my last post, this has always fascinated me about American culture, where we have this Old Testament sternness against crime but this glowing admiration for the guys and gals who made it look fun.

"Prohibiton has made nothing but trouble..."

For this shortened week, I decided to do a couple of vintage criminals from a stash of old photos I came across.  We'll start with Alphonse Gabriel "Al" Capone, known to some as "Scarface," and perhaps the best known of American gangsters, who came to prominence through smuggling and bootlegging liquor.  It's still a fascinating irony to me that the outlawing of liquors greatest achievement was to cement the foothold of organized crime in America (although, when you think about it, the suppression of one evil does often open the door for a larger one to move in).  Also, I'm equally fascinated by the contradiction by which Americans detest crime and criminals, and yet adores gangsters and outlaws...but more on that next tme.