Today is Saturday, so I feel like I can run a bit long. And there’s been one thing missing from this series to date: trains. I’m sure at least some of my readers are train fans, right?
“On the Track”, a 1940s film made by Carl Dudley for the Association of American Railroads. Mr. Dudley was apparently a fairly well known railroad film maker.
Bonus video #1: from 1952, “Northwest Empire”, a Union Pacific promo film about travel around Oregon and Washington.
Bonus video #2: “At This Moment”, from 1954. Propaganda film about the importance of American railroads.
I have to admit: “Kelly” is kind of cute in that 1950s way. I can see why someone would send her a dozen roses.
The NYT obit for Roy Horn wasn’t up when I was writing last night, but it is now.
We are all mourning the loss of #RoyHorn of #SiegfriedandRoy. S&R invented, created, pioneered the very idea that a magic show could be a full evening in Vegas. If not for S&R there would be no P&T in Vegas. He was so full of life, wild, and unpredictable. We will miss him. pic.twitter.com/sHW5NAyBMu
Forty years ago today, at about 3:40 in the afternoon Pacific time, five losers tried to hold up the Security Pacific Bank branch in Norco, California.
The five guys involved in the robbery were pretty much a loose collection of friends and relatives. There were two sets of brothers involved. The ostensible leader of the group had converted to a form of fundamentalist Christianity in the 70s, and had also become obsessed with a lot of the global catastrophe thinking going on at the time (Jupiter Effect, earthquakes, etc.) The main purpose of the robbery was to get funds so they could build and stock a compound. When the s–t hit the fan, they planned to retreat there with their families and ride out the apocalypse.
It didn’t go as planned. The robbers had planned to set off a large explosion as a diversion, but that failed, and the robbery was pretty much blown right away. Riverside County Sheriff’s Department responded, with the first officer on scene within seconds. The five robbers had managed to accumulate what even I would call a truly impressive stash of guns, ammo, and improvised explosive devices, and a firefight broke out between the RCSD and the five robbers. The responding deputies were outgunned, but continued to engage.
The robbers tried to flee in their (stolen) getaway van, but a lucky shot from one of the RCSD officers killed their getaway driver and the van crashed. The remaining four robbers hijacked a work truck from a passing driver (still shooting it out with RCSD) and fled.
The robbery team then proceeded to lead law enforcement (RCSD, the California Highway Patrol, and the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department) on a merry chase of approximately 25 miles (possibly 35 miles: sources differ) through the Inland Empire, into the San Gabriel Mountains, and up a dirt road. They were firing at the officers and throwing IEDs the whole way: according to Wikipedia, 33 police cars and a helicopter were damaged by gunfire.
Once they got into the mountains, the robbery team repeatedly pulled ahead on the dirt road, then stopped in an attempt to ambush the responding officers. At the time, the radio systems they used did not inter-operate: officers from one department, who could communicate with their department’s helicopter, were relaying messages on the one available “mutual aid” frequency to the other departments warning of ambushes.
The robbery team was finally stopped by a washed out area of the dirt road, exited the truck and ambushed the officers chasing them. Deputy James Evans of the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department was shot and killed. Two deputies behind Evans (D. J. McCarty and James McPheron of the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department) brought into play the SBCSD’s only rifle: a stolen M-16 that had been dumped from a moving car, recovered by the department, and kept when the military said “We don’t want it back”. Supposedly, it didn’t look like much, but it fired.
(At one point, responding law enforcement officers pulled over and commandeered a lever-action rifle from a target shooter who was walking along the road. This particular area was in common use as an informal range, and the robbery team had practiced shooting there. Unfortunately, the lever-action rifle the deputies commandeered was a .22.)
When SBCSD started firing back on full-auto, the robbery team decided it was time to make like the trees and get out of there. They fled into the forest. Three of them surrendered or were captured the following day. The fourth one was tracked down by a law enforcement team, was shot multiple times when he refused to surrender, and apparently killed himself with a shot to the chest from his .38.
There was, of course, a trial. From the account I’ve read, it may have been the closest thing to a courtroom circus California ever saw before OJ. The trial lasted 14 months: at the end of it, the three surviving bank robbers were sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole. All three remain in the California penal system today.
The definitive, and (to the best of my knowledge, only) account of this story is Peter Houlahan’s Norco ’80: The True Story of the Most Spectacular Bank Robbery in American History. I’m embarrassed to admit: I’d never heard of the Norco robbery until I saw a reference to Houlahan’s book somewhere. I was in high school at the time, and I thought I was fairly aware of current events and the world around me. So finding out there was a major bank robbery and shootout in California that wasn’t North Hollywood and that I’d never heard of kind of blew my mind.
I have mixed feelings about the book, though. The early chapters about the background of the robbery team and especially the leader kind of bugged me. Houlahan seemed to be kind of condescending about the more mainstream aspects of the leader’s Christian beliefs. And he didn’t answer the one question I have: where did these five losers, who were either under-employed on unemployed, get the money to accumulate all those guns and ammo? (He doesn’t say anything about them stealing weapons: all of their purchases were apparently legit over the counter sales at gun shops. Stealing guns: bad. Bank robbery: A-OK?)
Once he settles down and actually gets into the robbery, though, Houlahan’s book became much more interesting to me. I think he did an excellent job of profiling many of the law enforcement people involved, especially several members of the RCSD and their struggles (both before and after the robbery). Andy Delgado’s story is especially compelling to me. I think he was also pretty strong on the lack of preparation by RCSD and the other agencies involved for an event like this. The departments were still armed with mostly revolvers and shotguns, and almost no rifles (officially). They also did a sorry job of managing PTSD for the responding officers. Several of them (including Glyn Bolasky) left law enforcement afterwards. (Deputy Bolasky recovered from his injuries, and, after leaving law enforcement, joined the Air Force and became a Lieutenant Colonel.)
Houlahan’s also pretty good about the trial, which I haven’t gone into a lot of detail about. I’ll refer you to his book if you want that part of the story. And, to his credit, he tried really hard to be precise about firearms and firearms terminology. There are a couple of places where he slipped up (repeated references to the robbers having a “.357 rifle” in their intended getaway car: I’m pretty sure he meant “.375 H&H”).
Someone has posted a documentary/training film, apparently made by the Irvine Police Department in 1982, on YouTube. (Officer Rolf Parkes, who is credited in the first video, was with RCSD at the time and was injured in the shootout.) It is longish (close to an hour) but broken up into three chunks for your viewing pleasure, and well worth watching. (The transfer quality is also better than some of those vintage Motorola videos.)
From 1943: “Kill Or Be Killed”, a short film explaining in no uncertain terms that there are no rules of sportsmanship on the battlefield.
Bonus video #1: “Don’t Kill Your Friends”, also from 1943. I’m pulling this one out because…well…you’ll see less than 30 seconds in.
“…he’s not so much a name, as a state of mind.” Truer words were never spoken, about both the movie character and his namesake.
Bonus video #2: “Shoot To Kill”. This is actually a British Army training film, about the proper use (and effective ranges) of various issue weapons, including the Bren gun and anti-tank rifles.
Will I try to cover the remote DEFCON remotely? I don’t know right now. I want to see what form the remote conference takes, and how it fits in to my schedule, before I commit to anything. If I can, I will, but no promises yet.
Gil Schwartz, former spokesman for CBS. He also wrote columns for Esquire and Fortune magazines, and a bunch of books, under the pseudonym “Stanley Bing”.
I feel like I’ve been running long the past couple of days, so I’m going to try to get back into the “fits into a coffee break” mode today. I’m also going to serve up yet another slice of processed 1970s cheese.
“Use Your Eyes”, a police training film on how to spot evidence of…marijuana!
Bonus video: “Burglary In Progress”. To be honest, this is another one of those lower quality tranfers from old Motorola training films. I still think it’s interesting. The first couple of minutes go over the standard “how to prevent being burgled” advice, but after that, there’s a lot of “how to search buildings” and “how to prevent suspects from escaping”.
Here’s something on the shorter side. This is also animated, so you can share it with your children. After all, everyone knows that anything animated is for kids.
From 1962, and also from the Bell System: “A Missile Named Mac”. Nice short little animated video about how ballistic missile guidance systems worked at the time.
I’m not exactly sure who is doing the talking here. I’d figure once “Mac” hits the target at 300 miles puer minute, he’s pretty much obliterated. Does “Mac” transfer his consciousness from missile to missile? Does this open up a whole weird can of metaphysical worms?
You know, the police do have things other than cars and guns.
For example, tear gas. (Sorry: this is a bit on the longer side.)
As best as I can tell, the Lake Erie Chemical Company (a good Cleveland firm) eventually merged with/was acquired by Bangor Punta. Bangor Punta also owned Smith and Wesson during this period, and was trying to become a one-stop shop conglomerate for everything the well equipped police department needed: guns, tear gas, holsters, handcuffs, helmets…
Bonus video: here’s a slice of 1970s cheese for you. “Anything Can Happen”, a 1973 police recruiting film…
…a British police recruiting film. Those fashions! That music!
I especially appreciate the fact that this is subtitled.
The third and fourth films in the series were co-written by Frank Capra and Jonathan Latimer. Mr. Latimer was fairly famous as a crime novelist as well as a screenwriter. (He also wrote the screenplays for “The Glass Key” and “The Big Clock”, among other credits.) I haven’t read any of Latimer’s work, but I have heard the name come up before. According to Wikipedia, he wrote a book called Solomon’s Vineyard in 1941: it was so racy that it wasn’t published in the US until 1950, and was heavily censored at that time.
The third film in the series was “The Strange Case of the Cosmic Rays”.
The fourth film in the series: “The Unchained Goddess”, about weather. Capra produced this one, and wrote the screenplay with Latimer, but did not direct: Richard Carlson did that job.
Apparently, the television ratings for these next two films were disappointing. Capra wasn’t happy either: I gather that he felt the Bell System was interfering too much with his creative vision. He was replaced after “The Unchained Goddess” and went back to directing Hollywood films. His first one after “The Unchained Goddess” was “A Hole In the Head”, with Frank Sinatra and Edward G. Robinson. You may remember that as the movie that introduced “High Hopes”.
But what happened with the Bell System Science Series? Next week: “Produced under the personal supervision of Jack L. Warner”.
A couple of things I wanted to make note of, but didn’t want to put in the main video feed:
Great and good FoTB (and official firearms trainer of WCD) Karl Rehn did a really cool short video targeted at newer shooters explaining ammunition (and the various types thereof):
This was done for the Polite Society Podcast, which does, of course, have a YouTube channel.
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