CHARLES ARTHUR FLOYD: 'PRETTY BOY' FROM COOKSON HILLS

So much of the Charles Arthur "Pretty Boy" Floyd story is also the story of an era and a place. When the motivating force of central characters is found in the place where they lived, in the time they lived, or in a particular venture of circumstance, that factor if not all three becomes a co-star in the story. To help me define Floyd as the quintessential motor bandit of the 1930s Dust Bowl, I referred to the following sources that gave me great insight to the soul of a man and the aura of the green-mountain-hoe-down he called his life.

The lyrics that appear at the opening of each chapter are from songs traditional to the Cookson Hills where Choc Floyd grew up. The only exception is Woody Guthrie's "The Ballad of Pretty Boy Floyd," which came later, but, I understand, remains popular in the area today.

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Biography television presentation: "Pretty Boy Floyd: The Peoples Bandit." Produced by Greystone Communications for A&E Network, 1995.

Borus, Daniel H, ed., These United States Portraits of America in the 1920s. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992.

Hamilton, Sue L., "Pretty Boy" Floyd America's Most Wanted Public Enemy series.Minneapolis: Abdo & Daughters, 1989.

King, Jeffery S., The Life and Death of Pretty Boy Floyd. Kent, OH: The Kent StateUniversity Press, 1998.

Nash, Jay Robert, Bloodletters and Badmen. NY: M. Evans, 1983.

Nash, Jay Robert, Dictionary of Crime Criminal Justice, Criminology & LawEnforcement. NY: Paragon House, 1992.

Smith, Charles M.B. "Making the Twenties (and Thirties) Roar," article in the Oklahoma Rifle Association Sharpshooter, July/August, 1979 edition.

Toland, John, The Dillinger Days. NY: Random House, 1963.

Wallis, Michael, Pretty Boy The Life and Times of Charles Arthur Floyd. NY: St.Martin's Press, 1992.