“I know it had been parked in that spot,” I told Laureen.

“How do you lose a car?” She asked.

I didn’t know, but I knew who would: the friendly bartender across the room.

No, I had not misplaced my vehicle after drinking an adult beverage. We were looking for the bullet-riddled Bonnie and Clyde V8 Ford last seen at Whiskey Pete’s in Primm, Nevada.

The midwestern, small-time thieves and killers met their fateful end while driving the stolen Ford on a country road on May 23, 1934. Law enforcement officers were waiting for the duo and greeted them with a barrage of lead. They were not about to take any chances with the pair wanted for the cold-blooded murders of at least 13 people and countless robberies.

Nope, Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker met their end with at least 112 bullets fired at them.

“You want to know where the car is?” Frank, the bartender, asked me. It was nine in the morning, and even though we had stopped at the casino, it was too early for me to belly up to the bar. We just needed some information, and the smiling man was eager to supply it.

I nodded. “You guys do have all the answers and even know the question before it is even asked.”

Laureen, my lovely wife, merely shook her head. I’ve noticed she does that a lot lately when I talk.

“They moved it across the interstate to Buffalo Bill’s,” he told us. And he also informed us that the car may be haunted. “I’ve never seen anything spooky, but a friend of mine who works late once said he saw a shadowy figure in clothing from the thirties standing beside the rear bumper. When he went over, no one was there.”

And off we went to see the car and see if Clyde Barrow was wandering around wondering why his shirt had so many holes in it.

‘Bonnie had just laundered it by the old crick and I could swear there were no holes in it when she had me put it on,’ his specter may be wondering.

It should be noted that I am not a fan of the killers who were so famously shot up as they rode in their stolen car – quite the opposite. These murderers are, unfortunately, a slice of Americana during the time of the Great Depression. Unemployment was over 25 percent, food lines were a norm in large cities, folks leaving their homes in the East and heading West with hopes of finding work, and there were people like Bonnie and Clyde stealing and killing, sometimes just for fun.

It was also the era of gangsters like Pretty Boy Floyd, Machine Gun Kelly, John Dillinger, Toots Galore, and many more.

“Wonder why they moved it?” Laureen asked as we returned to our non-shot-up car in the parking lot of Whiskey Pete’s.

“Perhaps it just appeared there,” I replied. “Like magic…or worse.”

Turns out that after the killing duo met their demise, there were a lot of shot-up ‘Bonnie and Clyde Death Cars’ making the rounds in the United States. People would plop down a nickel and then get a chance to ooh and aah, counting the bullet holes that had torn through the metal of the V8.

“I counted 50, ma,” Little Richtie may have told his ma.

“Man said there were over a hundred,” Ma may have replied. “Count ’em agin.”

But the one now located within Buffalo Bill’s is the real deal. The Ford had been put on display after the killings for nearly 30 years in carnivals, amusement parks, state fairs, and other such public places where people could get a glimpse of the last sitting spot of Bonnie and Clyde,

For a dollar, folks could sit in the front seat for a photo-op when the car turned up in Las Vegas in the 1970s. 

“Smile pretty,” the photographer may have said to a paying customer. “Don’t mind the blood spots.”

Over the next couple of decades, the death car moved from various locations until finally stopping at Whiskey Pete’s, and more recently, it was moved to an entire gangster-styled wing at Buffalo Bill’s.

As we wandered the rather eclectic Buffalo Bill’s casino interior, it was easy to find.

“There it is,” I said, as in the short distance the death car – that is the name it goes by – I could make out the bullet-riddled remains of the V8 surrounded by tall and thick plexiglass.

Inside the enclosure are two dummies made to look like the two dummies that met their untimely end within the car. Did I mention I was not a fan of Bonnie and Clyde?

The location of the car is rather unique, and the lighting is a bit dim as to represent a darkness about the car and the people killed inside it, perhaps. But it had an exciting effect, on purpose or not.

Near the vehicle is a large kiosk with photographs showing the aftermath of the gunfight, along with newspaper articles from the period, and other artifacts including personal effects of the couple from when they were alive.

From when they were dead is the blood-stained bullet-ridden shirt Clyde had been wearing while killed behind the wheel.

One sadly exciting artifact is a news clipping stating that over 20,000 people attended Bonnie’s funeral and over 15,000 attended Clyde’s. It is believed through the articles on display that many people in the country believed that the couple were more like a pair of Robin Hoods than just the plain thugs they were.

There is no evidence they gave away their stolen loot to the poor of the time.

Also, a place to sit for a few moments and watch a short video of the couple runs 24/7 for those wanting to remember Bonnie and Clyde and their life story.

We skipped the screening.

A short distance away, we found the 1931 black Lincoln bulletproof sedan once owned by New York gangster Dutch Schultz, which, in turn, was then taken by Al Capone after Schultz’s murder in 1935. It was then rumored that the car was used by President Franklin D. Roosevelt after it had been confiscated by the federal government and Capone sent to Alcatraz.

A little-known fact: Dutch Schultz was murdered while using a urinal at an upscale restaurant in Newark, New Jersey. The urinal is not on display at Buffalo Bill’s.

Having written a column about the Mob Museum in Las Vegas, I found seeing such a vehicle in Primm, Nevada, interesting. A lot of history and violence tied to both cars on display but again another piece of Americana. It is not the best part of the United States’ history, but with all countries, there is the good and bad – and we must be able to view it and perhaps learn from it.

Visitors snapped selfies, took group photos, and just took in the scene of two vehicles that have been seen and portrayed in docudramas and Hollywood films.

Speaking of Hollywood, the 1967 movie Bonnie and Clyde, starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, was a box office smash.

As we were leaving Buffalo Bill’s, I took another tour of the couple’s car and wondered how many lives these two ruthless killers changed for the worse. 

Too many, I imagined.

John can be contacted at: beyersbyways@gmail.com

Information

BONNIE & CLYDE EXHIBITION