The Bobbed Haired Bandit: A True Story of Crime and Celebrity in 1920s New York
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"With crisp prose and a lively selection of newspaper photographs, headlines, cartoons, and excerpts, authors Stephen Duncombe and Andrew Mattson tell a story of an outlaw couple and, through them, the story of an era."
—Boston Globe
"A pre-Bonnie and Clyde story...in all its tacky, trailer park intrigue."
—Blue Ridge Business Journal
"Brings alive the darker side of flapper-era Manhattan."
—Entertainment Weekly
?It could have come out of Hollywood. . . . Stephen Duncombe and Andrew Mattson tell the story of this largely unremembered saga of crime and pursuit. The writing has velocity, and the amazing plot, with all its twists and turns, is alone worth the admission. More than just narrative history, the book is about representation — the multiple ways that the crime was reported in the New York press and ?instrumentalized and mobilized? for a variety of causes.?
—Journal of American History
"The Bobbed Haired Bandit is a fun read about a forgotten episolde."
—Justice
"Hello, Hollywood? Please option this book- I can't wait to see the movie version."
—Bust
"A book for anyone who loves a good crime thriller, this will appeal to even those who stay away from the non-fiction section of the book store."
—Parkersburg News and Sentinenal
"Combines history, popular culture, and the study of the press to bring to life a 19-year-old laundress from Brooklyn named Celia Cooney."
—New York Sun
"Celia Cooney was her real name, but in the early 1920s, after she and her husband committed a series of stickups in New York City, the world came to know her as the Bobbed Haired Bandit. Besides being a criminal, she was a godsend. Newspapers loved her, poets and song writers enshrined her in doggerel, pundits theorized about the effects of poverty on her ilk, the urban poor. There was even talk of sterilizing 'the unfit.' In The Bobbed Haired Bandit: A True Story of Crime and Celebrity in 1920s New York, Stephen Duncombe and Andrew Mattson point out the many uses to which Cooney's example could be put: 'She was a feminist heroine and a wanton vamp. She was symptomatic of a permissive society that coddled its criminals and the unfortunate product of the slums and the factory, an argument for law and order, and a call for progressive social reform.'"
—Washington Post
"This rollicking true-crimer's subject recalls the nearly concurrent and similarly trumpeted Roxie Hart case in Chicago, which inspired the musical Chicago. Since Duncombe and Mattson relentlessly reference their story without killing readability, this is a win-win package for true-crime. Roaring Twenties, and pop-culture fans alike."
—Booklist
"The Bobbed Haired Bandit is that increasingly rare species of historical work, a wild ride that happens to be true, a thumping good read that is built on truly impeccable research, and a rich portrait of America at a moment of crucial change that is as entertaining as any movie. Stephen Duncombe and Andrew Mattson arrive on the scene as already accomplished masters of their profession; and this book will appeal to any and all readers who want follow a seemingly unbelievable tale with the confidence that they can trust their guides absolutely. It?s true crime, it's top-notch American history, it's flat-out fun—grab it."
—Caleb Carr, author of The Alienist and The Italian Secretary
"This book is a fascinating look at a young woman who looked at her options and decided to play the P.R. game before the term had been invented. An historical account that reads like Doctorow, The Bobbed Haired Bandit is non-fiction at its most accessible."
—Crime Spree Magazine
"In 1924, Celia Cooney, a newly married laundress in Brooklyn, found herself unexpectedly pregnant. The Cooneys' $30-a-week income couldn't support a baby. So Celia and her husband, Ed, began holding up neighborhood drugstores. In this riveting book, the authors, scholars in history and media studies reconstruct and analyze not only the crime spree but also the ensuing media frenzy. Savvy newspaper editors knew the story of a girl with a gun would sell; they christened Celia the Bobbed Hair Bandit and made her a star. According to the authors, she stood in for the era's anxieties about changing gender roles, her bob a symbol of liberated women. Suddenly, any gal with a bob was seen as a potential threat—even Zelda Fitzgerald was reportedly pulled over by cops and questioned. Once Celia was finally arrested, the public learned about her grueling childhood and negligent mother. Editorialists, including progressive pundit Walter Lippmann, then held Celia up as an example of what happened to poor and abused children when society failed to intervene. Duncombe and Mattson's fast-paced account of Cooney's story is an absolute winner."
—Publishers Weekly
"A phenominally complete work of historical literature: gripping, suspenseful, fast-moving, kaleidoscopic, gimlet-eyed, analytic, penetrating, sympathetic, and oddly tender. Its scholarship is solid, its implications are profound, and it's at least as good as a movie."
—Luc Sante, author of Low Life and New York Noir
"NYU Press has put out a page-turner, and this one's a gem. Transforms a lurid front page news story into a fascinating window through which we learn about so many of the social, cultural, and moral issues that were reshaping the face of America in the 1920s. Rarely does a vivid close-up portrait offer readers such a broad and informative historical perspective."
—Stuart Ewen, author of PR! A Social History of Spin
"This is a wonderfully accessible introduction to the history and culture of the 1920s enlivened by multiple perspectives from which police, newspaper reporters, and the central figures understood unfolding events. Brilliantly written, the book fascinated, amused, and gripped me throughout—like a good mystery it even had a surprise twist or two at the end."
—Daniel J. Walkowitz, New York University
"Like the movie Chicago, this account of a gun-toting New York flapper in the Roaring Twenties reveals the myths and realities of urban crime in its most colorful era."
—Thomas A. Reppetto, author of NYPD: A City and its Police and President, Citizens Crime Commission of NYC, Inc.
Ripped straight from the headlines of the Jazz Age, The Bobbed Haired Bandit is a tale of flappers and fast cars, of sex and morality. In the spring of 1924, a poor, 19-year-old laundress from Brooklyn robbed a string of New York grocery stores with a "baby automatic," a fur coat, and a fashionable bobbed hairdo. Celia Cooney's crimes made national news, with the likes of Ring Lardner and Walter Lippman writing about her exploits for enthralled readers.
The Bobbed Haired Bandit brings to life a world of great wealth and poverty, of Prohibition and class conflict. With her husband Ed at her side, Celia raised herself from a life of drudgery to become a celebrity in her own pulp-fiction novel, a role she consciously cultivated. She also launched the largest manhunt in New York City's history, humiliating the police with daring crimes and taunting notes.
Sifting through conflicting accounts, Stephen Duncombe and Andrew Mattson show how Celia's story was used to explain the world, to wage cultural battles, to further political interest, and above all, to sell newspapers. To progressives, she was an example of what happens when a community doesn't protect its children. To conservatives, she symbolized a permissive society that gave too much freedom to the young, poor, and female. These competing stories distill the tensions of the time.
In a gripping account that reads like a detective serial, Duncombe and Mattson have culled newspaper reports, court records, interviews with Celia's sons, and even popular songs and jokes to capture what William Randolph Hearst's newspaper called "the strangest, weirdest, most dramatic, most tragic, human interest story ever told."
Customer Review: A Bang-up Return for the Flapper Gun Gal
Celia Cooney, most celebrated as the "Bobbed-Haired Bandit" of the Twenties, comes vividly to life in this scholarly yet entertaining exploration of her brief life of crime and celebrity, with emphasis on the celebrity. Both Celia's own recognition of her fame and the multifaceted interpretations of it by police, press, and the public make for fascinating reading. Her duel persona as the aspiring flapper and expectant mother who joins her husband on holdups to make ends meet makes for one of the more compelling crime stories of the Jazz Age. Her later life, concealing her criminal past while raising her sons who knew nothing of it, presents a striking contrast to the young lady bandit who publicly gloried in her exploits. The photos are equally intriguing and belie the image of the dangerous gunwoman, especially when tiny, harmless-looking Celia is standing alongside husband Ed. And there are plenty of absolutely classic old crime cartoons from New York newspapers. Alternately funny, shocking, touching, and harrowing, this is one of the best historical crime books I've read in a while.
Customer Review: Authors don't prove premise, still captivating story
The Bobbed Haired Bandit by Stephen Duncombe and Andrew Mattson tells the story of Celia and Ed Cooney in 1920s New York. Newlyweds and newly pregnant, Ed and Celia decide to rob some convenience stores to try and make a better life for themselves. Because Celia has bobbed hair, flapper style, the story of their robberies quickly grab the attention of the newspapers and soon the police. The Cooneys find that the stolen money doesn't last long and after a succession of several small hold-ups, flee to Florida only to be captured shortly after the death of their newborn daughter. The authors spend a great deal of time in the beginning of the book discussing the sociological implications of Celia's celebrity, but they can't seem to decide on what exactly the public's obsession with her meant. Much ink is also given to the personal histories of the cops chasing them, but they detract from the real story of Celia. Perhaps one of the most captivating details is that Celia's sons didn't find out about their mother until she had passed away. Celia Cooney was a woman of mystery to the papers in the 1920s and remained one in her life, even to her family. Now there's a story.
