The Kansas City Massacre
Part of a black and white series, the 'Kansas City Massacre' is an acrylic on canvas historic timepiece around the "Pretty Boy Floyd" Kansas City Massacre of 1933 at Union Station, painted 2012. A snippet from the wiki article on the subject:
At this point, Agent Caffrey walked around the car to get into the driver's seat through the left door. SAC Vetterli stood with Officers Hermanson and Grooms at the right side near the front of the car.
A green Plymouth was parked about six feet away on the right side of Agent Caffrey's car. Looking in the direction of this Plymouth, Agent Lackey saw two men run from behind a car. He noticed that both men were armed, at least one of them with a machine gun.
Before Agent Lackey had a chance to warn his fellow officers, one of the gunmen shouted, "Up, up!" At this instant, Agent Smith, who was in the middle of the back seat, also saw a man with a machine gun to the right of the Plymouth. SAC Vetterli, who was standing at the right front of the Chevrolet turned just in time to hear a voice command, "Let 'em have it!"
At this point, from a distance approximately 15 feet diagonally to the right of Agent Caffrey's Chevrolet, an individual crouched behind the radiator of another car opened fire. Officers Grooms and Hermanson immediately fell to the ground, dead. SAC Vetterli, who was standing beside Officers Grooms and Hermanson, was shot in the left arm and dropped to the ground. As he attempted to scramble to the left side of the car to join Agent Caffrey, who had not yet entered the driver's seat of the Chevrolet, Vetterli saw Caffrey fall to the ground. He had been fatally wounded in the head.
Inside the car, Frank Nash and Chief Reed were killed. Agents Lackey and Smith were able to survive the massacre by falling forward in the back seat of the Chevrolet. Lackey was struck and seriously wounded by three bullets in the back. Smith was unscathed.
The three gunmen rushed to the lawmen's car and looked inside. One of them was heard to shout "They're all dead. Let's get out of here." With that, they raced toward a dark-colored Chevrolet. Just then a Kansas City policeman emerged from Union Station and began firing in the direction of one of the killers, later identified as Floyd, who slumped briefly but continued to run. The killers entered the car which sped westward out of the parking area and disappeared.
What made this 1933 historic event so pronounced because of "Pretty Boy" Charles Floyd's involvement. "Pretty Boy" Floyd was a notorious criminal for his era, hated by the law enforcement, but not necessarily hated by the people. While he was a criminal for sure, "Pretty Boy" Floyd more likened himself as a modern day Jesse James, or another form of an "outlaw with a conscious".
What makes the story even more riveting and interesting was the claims of innocence. "Pretty Boy" Floyd was a criminal no doubt, but a massacre was very out of character for him. What makes the story even more interesting was the involvement of notoriously corrupt FBI boss J. Edgar Hoover and the possibility of "Pretty Boy" being setup.
From wiki:
The FBI account—including Floyd's involvement—has been disputed in three recent books: Joe Urschel's The Year of Fear (2015), Robert Unger's Union Station Massacre: The Original Sin of J. Edgar Hoover's FBI (1997) and Michael Wallis' Floyd biography Pretty Boy (1994). The authors believe that Floyd and Richetti were framed by the FBI. The matter is likely to remain highly controversial, as evidence against the two men is far from conclusive. Urschel and Wallis maintain that the massacre is completely out of character with the rest of Floyd's known career. Additionally, longtime underworld figure Blackie Audett wrote in Rap Sheet (1954) that Floyd and Richetti weren't involved, and that the other two gunmen were really Maurice Denning and William "Solly" Weissman.
A majority of my art is 'Realism' utilizing acrylic on canvas. To get brush stroke textures, I have developed a technique of using a gel substrate to add depth to the canvas before color is applied. Most of my paintings are large in size, with this piece being 4ftx4ft in dimension. The piece was finished in 2012, with the physical piece displayed in my father's personal gallery. While not currently on the market for sale, offers could always be made here.
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