Outlaw Tales of Kansas: True Stories Of The Sunflower State's Most Infamous Crooks, Culprits, And Cutthroats

by Sarah Smarsh

A refreshing new perspective on some of the most infamous reprobates of the Midwest.

Genres: Nonfiction, History

144 pages, Paperback

First published June 15, 2010

About the author

Sarah Smarsh is a journalist who has reported for The New York Times, Harper’s, the Guardian, and many other publications. Her first book, Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth, was a finalist for the National Book Award. Her second book, She Come by It Natural: Dolly Parton and the Women Who Lived Her Songs, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Smarsh is a frequent political commentator and speaker on socioeconomic class.

Reviews

[fc7reads · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a very short and repetitive book. To some degree, that cannot be helped because the outlaws of the late 1800s overlapped with one another quite often. Still, there are elements of the writing that make this worse. The chapters are not written as a continuous narrative. Each feels like a separate, wholly unconnected entry. Therefore, instead of establishing early on that "Indian Territory" is now known as the state of Oklahoma, details like this are repeated an eye-roll-inducing number of times.

Additionally, typos in published works bug me. This book contains several. A few examples: In the Phil Coe chapter the year 1971 is referenced when the story is clearly about 1871. In the Newton chapter, the word approve is used when the context of the sentence indicates that the word improve is what was intended. In the Bender chapter, Cherryvale is written correctly at least a dozen times followed by Cherry vale at the end of the chapter. The same paragraph features nineteenthcentry.

There are three stories at the end of the book with which I was not familiar before reading the book. Stella Hyman, impregnated by her nephew and angry that her sister and brother-in-law will not permit her to marry him, uses flypaper to poison her niece, sister, and brother-in-law. The latter two die and her niece's health is so severely diminished that she is considered an invalid. The other story that was new to me is the history of Robert Stroud, Birdman (of Alcatraz). Though there is a book and a movie about his life, I had never heard of him.

[Cynthia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a “fun” book to read but it seems like the chapters were originally a series of magazine articles as there is a fair amount of repetition.

[MKF · Rating 1 out of 5]

The big problem is that I don't think calling Big Nose Kate an outlaw is be not only a stretch but historically inaccurate. It's also unfair that the author included photos of the person if available but the author chose to add a photo of Doc Holliday instead of a photo of Kate. There's actually no photos of female in this book for the few women included. There's a lot of flawed information, bad editing, and a lot of repetitiveness. Not a book that I would recommend.

[Judi · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a transplant to Kansas, I had not known that so much of what is associated with the Wild West happened here - the notoriously wild towns, the shootouts, the celebrated bad men. This book was fun and fascinating and helped me understand the history of Kansas that much more.

[David Blankenship · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice little collection of stories of bad people doing bad things.

[Buddy Liston · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quick read, short stories about notable Kansas bandits and murders. I found it interesting reading about the towns I have frequented in Kansas. Kansas was a roudy place 150 years ago.

[Allen Beckner · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fun fast read.