Two of the most famous desperadoes of the Great Depression will be the subject of a special program at the Avoyelles Parish Library in Marksville on May 2.

 

Dr. Joanne Vermaelen Dauzat will give a presentation on the lives and criminal careers of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow -- known in headlines of the day and to moviegoers of another generation as “Bonnie and Clyde.”

 

The program will begin at 10 a.m. and is free and open to the public. Seating is limited. Those planning to attend are asked to call 253-7559 to register to assist staff in ensuring adequate seating is available.

 

Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were dirt-poor young adults growing up in West Dallas during the Depression. Out of work and with seemingly no way out of their circumstances, they turned to crime as a way to survive. They were among the first celebrity criminals of the 20th Century.

 

Several rolls of undeveloped film, handwritten poetry and clothes were left behind when they fled from a Joplin, Mo., hideout in 1933. The photos were published in local newspapers and were in newspapers all over the nation within a few days.

 

The couple was ambushed and killed by law enforcement agents a year after the Joplin photos made them notorious. The ambush occurred May 23, 1934, on a rural North Louisiana road between Sailes and Gibsland. The hail of bullets ended the lives of Bonnie and Clyde, but if anything it only helped to ensure their legend.

 

Dr. Dauzat was born in Alexandria and lives in Arcadia, near the ambush site. She is director of External Projects and dean/professor emerita in the College of Education at Louisiana Tech. She has family roots in Avoyelles Parish.

 

Living in Arcadia, she heard many stories of the exploits of Bonnie and Clyde. She has traveled the same roads, seen the same sights and visited some of the same buildings as the infamous couple.

 

Folks along the journey generously shared their own insights about the couple, adding interesting revelations, and further complicating their legend.

 

“I am grateful to have learned the facts and perceptions of Bonnie and Clyde by eye witnesses to events -- including the ambush,” Dauzat said. “I am privileged to have spoken with the son of the Dallas deputy who participated in the ambush, and to have heard from the living relatives of Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker,” she continued. “All of these insights helped to piece  together the puzzle that was Bonnie and Clyde.”