"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 "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 Matteson arrive on the scene as already accomplished masters of their profession; and this book will appeal to any and all readers who want to 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, bestselling author of The Alienist and Angel of Darkness "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.".