Welcome, MMD! Hope to see many more thoughtful posts from you.
Pretty Boy Floyd, Jesse James, Billy the Kid: i understand the glamour and nostalgia for things past, but ive always wondered too how such mytholigising (spl?) arises through in some cases such desperate acts
American gangsters and desperados are always mythologized as "Robin Hoods," "friends of the poor," etc. As Don Cardi said, the truth is otherwise. Billy the Kid (William Bonney) was a pathological killer. Pretty Boy Floyd was a psychopath who enjoyed hurting people. Jesse James was a terrorist and torturer. But, their stories are interesting, make for good movies that people enjoy watching. So, the studios can get more people into a theater by portraying them as Robin Hoods than as psychopaths.
Dillinger caught a very bad break when he was young--he committed a petty crime, was advised to plead guilty in return for a short sentence, and ended up spending years in prison. He had real balls, breaking himself out of jail with a "gun" fashioned out of wood, and springing members of his own gang from jail in a daring raid. But he and his gang were thieves, plain and simple. And plenty of people who were in their way got killed.
My favourite has always been Bonnie and Clyde. I think Bonnie is a hottie, and i dig her so often derided poetry. Sure, its not great, but its Bonnie! Ive read some articles that try to paint Clyde as a homosexual in a union of pure crime with his partner, who would help lure guys (i guess) clyde thought were hot into kidnapping and forced abuse situations. Alternatively, some say they fucked like rabbits 24/7 and did the crimes to help them get off. Part of fore-play, like.
They were another pair who were mythologized. The rap on Clyde being gay stems from the fact that he was imprisoned at a young age, and was repeatedly raped by an older prisoner, whom he later killed in revenge. Did you ever see the US film "Bonny and Clyde," starring Warren Beatty, Gene Hackman and Fay Dunaway? A real classic.