Span above site of 1933 crash by Bonnie, Clyde faces demolition
Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow roared into Collingsworth County history in 1933 when their Ford coupe plunged off a washed-out bridge embankment north of Wellington.
That moment will be remembered at 11 a.m. Saturday in Pioneer Park, where the Collingsworth County Museum is scheduled to host a celebration to commemorate the site of the bridge, slated for demolition. The event will be followed by a barbecue luncheon at noon, and visitors will gather on the bridge for a final photograph at 1 p.m., said Doris Stallings, a museum official.
The historic truss bridge, built in 1939 and located about 6 miles north of Wellington on U.S. Highway 83, will be demolished this fall.
Wellington native Wes Reeves said a historical marker commemorating Bonnie and Clyde's now-famous crash will be moved to Pioneer Park.
"I think it's pretty much geared to anybody that's interested," Reeves said of Saturday's event. "It's been a landmark in that area for many years. The condition of the bridge is pretty bad and it would be pretty expensive to rehab it."
According to historic records:
On June 10, 1933, several members of the Sam Pritchard family were sitting on their porch when they heard a speeding car approaching. They watched as the Ford coupe missed a detour and plummeted off a river embankment where a previous bridge washed out.
Men from the house rushed to the car, pulled out the occupants and doused the smoking car with river water. The rescuers pulled two men and a woman - later identified as Bonnie Parker- from the car. The two men seized firearms from the wreckage.
Alonzo Cartwright, Pritchard's son-in-law, drove into Wellington to get a doctor for Bonnie, who suffered serious burns and was carried to the Pritchard house.
Clyde Barrow "was skinned up a little," Jack Pritchard said. He remembered hauling Bonnie from the car.
"She was not a very big girl, but she was all limber and kind of hard to carry," he said. "We was afraid she was dying, and they would not tell us who they were, but said, 'We are as hot as we can be and can't afford to have a doctor.'"
The Pritchards didn't know the couple were outlaws wanted in a series of killings and bank robberies.
"The Barrow brothers didn't mean anything to me," Sam Pritchard later told his wife. "All I knew was they were hurt and needed help, so we just naturally had to help them."
Collingsworth County Sheriff George Corry and Police Chief Paul Hardy drove to the Pritchard home. Bonnie Parker lay on a bed, apparently unconscious. Clyde Barrow and another gang member heard the two officers in the home. Parker emerged from the bedroom and took their guns.
During the excitement, Gladys Cartwright, holding a baby in one arm, reached over to latch a door. One of the desperadoes, apparently concerned that other officers might be nearby, fired his shotgun through a window, and buckshot ripped through Mrs. Cartwright's right hand. One of the men then shot out the tires on one of the family cars.
Before leaving, Clyde Barrow thumbed through a roll of bills and offered to pay "for all the trouble we've been to you."
Sam Pritchard replied, "No, if a man can't help another man, things are in pretty bad shape," according to the county's official history.
The trio handcuffed the sheriff and the police chief and sped off in the sheriff's car toward the Oklahoma line.
Somewhere near Sayre, western Oklahoma, the outlaws tied the officers to a cottonwood tree with barbed wire. The Barrow gang sped off into history in yet another daring escape from the law.
About a year later, Bonnie and Clyde died in a hail of bullets when Texas Rangers and other lawmen ambushed them May 23,1934, in rural Louisiana.
