Ma Barker, The Original Mob Mother

By Sponsor in Arts & Entertainment on Feb 27, 2013 6:00PM

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One of the mob's most infamous women was Kate "Ma" Barker, a Missouri woman accused of aiding, abetting and perhaps even organizing the criminal activities of her four gangster sons.

She was gunned down by the FBI in 1935, and her alleged role as a fierce mob mother was immortalized in history and pop culture via films like Ma Barker's Killer Brood and 1996's Public Enemies. Still, not much is known as to the extent of Barker's involvement with her sons' crimes, and there's been plenty of debate as to whether she deserved to be labeled Public Enemy No. 1 by the FBI.

Barker, née Arizona Clark, was born in Ash Grove, Missouri in 1873. She married George Barker in 1892, moved to Oklahoma and had four sons (Herman, Lloyd, Arthur and Fred). But George abandoned the family sometime in 1915, leaving them alone in the Wild West with little money. The four sons turned to crime early, and Barker reportedly made no attempt to stop them, instead working to protect them from getting caught and landing in prison long term (they all spent time in jail). Eventually, Barker's four sons banded with seasoned criminal Alvin Karpis to form the Barker-Karpis Gang, and the five of them committed robberies, murder, kidnapping and racketeering.

Barker didn't try to stop her sons, and by the early '30s rumors spread that she was in fact the gang's ringleader. Newspapers sensationalized her activities, putting her on par with criminal bigwigs like John Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde. Today there's little, if any, proof that Barker's involvement ran so deep, but she did travel with the gang from city to city, helping them hide from crime. "She knew we were criminals, but her participation in our careers was limited to one function: when we traveled together, we moved as a mother and her sons," Karpis told reporters years later. "What could look more innocent?"

In 1935, Barker and her youngest son, Fred, moved to Ocklawaha, Florida to hide out from the law. The then-61-year-old Barker posed as a rich widow, and purchased a home right on Lake Weir. But on January 16th, 1935, the FBI caught up with Barker and killed her and Fred in a bloody four-hour shootout. Barker was found dead in a bedroom on the second floor, and it is speculated that she shot herself; agents also found an arsenal of weapons and bulletproof vests.

The Florida home where "Doc" and "Ma" Barker were killed in a shootout the FBI; inset of the Barkers' weapons cache (FBI)

Barker's sons all met similar fates. One was killed trying to escape Alcatraz in 1939, and another was shot to death by his wife in the '40s (Herman, the eldest son, died in 1927). Some historians speculate that Barker's criminal role was augmented by then-FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. (Even today, the FBI states that she's "not...the criminal mastermind later media legend" she was purported to be.) But sensationalized or not, Barker's reputation as the toughest, roughest, baddest mob mother of them all lives on to this day.