The Wikimedia scans are of the images that appear in the yearbooks, with original text from the yearbooks extracted from the original scans and typed out (like ordinary text) for easier reading.
These yearbooks were also digitally scanned (showing the entire pages as they originally appeared in print) and stored on the Mooresville High School Alumni Association Facebook page, but access might be restricted to their authorized FB group members. You can check those links, too, to see if you can access them (click below):
The Mooresville High School Alumni Association has uploaded the complete video, Memories of Mooresville (2011), to YouTube. Click the player (below) to watch the entire video, or visit Mooresville Public Library to checkout a physical copy on DVD (learn more from this blog post).
Take our "virtual" walking tour (click link below) of historic downtown Mooresville, Indiana. Then, using this handout, walk the self-guided route yourself.
Take a walking (or driving) tour around Mooresville, Indiana to see John Dillinger-related points-of-interest around town. Click the images (throughout this article) to enlarge.
Can't make the walk/drive? Watch this video slideshow below.
John Dillinger's Mooresville Footprint
by Mooresville (Indiana) Public Library
DILLINGER’S HOMETOWN HOLDUP
(SELF-GUIDED WALKING TOUR)
Starting from Mooresville Public Library, follow famous bank robber and Mooresville resident John Dillinger’s footsteps during and after his botched attempted robbery of Frank Morgan, owner of the West End Grocery on West High Street, on Saturday, September 6, 1924. (Watch this video to learn more about this robbery attempt.)
Stop #1: Behind the First Christian Church on South Jefferson Street (between Harrison & High Streets)
Between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. on Saturday, September 6, 1924, Frank Morgan, proprietor of the West End Grocery (at 135 West High Street, where Morz/Pedigo Plumbing is located today) was walking home after closing the store. Suddenly, John Dillinger jumped from the shadows behind the First Christian Church holding a pistol and demanded money from Morgan. Unbeknownst to Dillinger, Morgan had taken the day’s proceeds to his house earlier in the evening and was not carrying much money at the time of the robbery attempt. Morgan and Dillinger scuffled, causing Dillinger to drop his firearm, which discharged harmlessly into the air. Dillinger then struck Morgan with a metal bar (something like a “blackjack” criminals sometimes used in muggings), opening a gash on Morgan’s head. Morgan, who was a Freemason, shouted a Masonry call of distress, to which fellow Masons throughout the neighborhood promptly responded. Dillinger panicked and fled east down Broad Alley. Dillinger’s accomplice, Ed Singleton, who was awaiting Dillinger in an automobile down the street (on South Jefferson close to High Street), raced off when he heard the errant gunshot.
Stop #2: Lindley Block, 1 West Main Street, Downtown Mooresville
Dillinger escaped along Broad Alley and made his way to Moore & Pearce, a pool hall in the basement of the Lindley Block (1 West Main Street, on the southwest corner of Main and Indiana Streets in downtown Mooresville). There, he asked customers and employees if “Mr. Morgan was all right” after being attacked. No one there had heard about Morgan’s injuries, since news of the event had not yet travelled downtown. Subsequently, several persons present wondered how Dillinger had known Morgan was hurt.
Lindley Block (first building on left) as it appeared in the Nineteen-Teens.
The building burnt to the ground on December 27, 1925
(Photo courtesy of the Mooresville Times, December 10, 1981, page 10a)
Moore & Pearce advertisement from the 1923 White Lick Review
(Mooresville High School Yearbook)
Dillinger went home to the family farm on Old State Road 267 (North Monroe Street at Northridge Drive) and confessed to his crime. His father recommended that his son turn himself in to Mooresville town marshal Greeson, which John voluntarily did. Frank Morgan required eleven stitches to sew-up his head wound, and at Dillinger’s trial, the judge rendered a harsh sentence (2-12 years on the first count, and 10-20 years on the second count, with $100 fines for each count) because John had severely injured Morgan and had carried a firearm during the robbery attempt. Dillinger’s accomplice, Ed Singleton, who retained an attorney (Dillinger did not), received a much lighter sentence in a separate trial. Dillinger was remanded to the Indiana state reformatory at Pendleton. During his incarceration, Dillinger, embittered by the severity of his sentencing, mingled with hardcore criminals who taught him tricks of the criminal trade and shaped his unlawful ambitions.
John Dillinger Mug Shot (ca. 1924)
DILLINGER AROUND TOWN
(MOORESVILLE, INDIANA)
There are three other locations in Mooresville significant to John Dillinger’s story: His family’s farm, Harvey Funeral Home, and the town ball park.
Drive-By #1: The Dillinger Family Farm
John Dillinger’s family farm was located on Old State Road 267 (North Monroe Street at Northridge Drive), as shown on the map (above). PLEASE NOTE: The Dillinger family farmhouse is a private residence. Please DO NOT DISTURB the residents or owners, and please do NOT take any photographs of the premises without express permission from the residents or owners.
(Above) Dillinger Farm (image courtesy of Evelyn Frechette)
(Below) John Dillinger outside the family farmhouse, holding a
Thompson submachine gun and, purportedly, the wooden gun he carved
to escape from Crown Point jail (photo 1934)
Drive-By #2: Harvey Funeral Home
Harvey Funeral Home was located on the southeast corner of Indiana and Harrison Streets in downtown Mooresville, where Marco's Pizza is now situated (as of 2024) and where Family Video used to be located. After John Dillinger was shot by FBI agents in Chicago in July, 1934, his remains were returned to Mooresville before burial at Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis. Hundreds braved the 103° F. heat wave to see Dillinger’s body at Harvey Funeral Home on July 25, 1934 (see photo below). The line of onlookers circled the block twice.
(Above) John Dillinger’s Body at Harvey Funeral Home, July 25, 1934
(Below) Unloading John Dillinger’s remains at Harvey Funeral Home
Mooresville historian Clara Richardson wrote in her History of Mooresville, 1824-1974 that the Bradley Brick Company, which was located south of East South Street (east of the railroad tracks), was purchased by the Wooley Company. When Chester E. Lawrence owned the business, he sold a parcel of land to the Town of Mooresville to be used as the Town Baseball Park. It was there that Mooresville’s semi-professional baseball team, the Walkovers, played their home games. In 1924 John Dillinger was a member of the Walkovers’ team roster, playing shortstop and second base. Dillinger also played the same positions on the Martinsville Athletics (see images below), another semi-professional baseball team. (Dillinger is indicated by the arrow.)
John Dillinger as a Player on the Martinsville Athletics Baseball Team (1924)
The 1919 Mooresville Walkovers Baseball Team Won 26 Straight Games
(Post last updated December 5, 2019) Although John Dillinger was born in Indianapolis (at 2053 Cooper Street), he moved with his family to Mooresville when he was young and spent his formative years here. (There's a self-guided walking--or driving--tour of significant Dillinger points-of-interest around town.) After a harsh criminal sentence for a botched local holdup sent him to prison (shaping his unlawful ambitions), he became a hardened criminal, robbing banks and entering American folk legend.
John Dillinger's Funeral
(Mooresville Moments #17)
(Click Above to Play Video)
After Dillinger was shot by FBI agents in Chicago in July, 1934, his
remains were returned to Mooresville before burial at Crown Hill
Cemetery in Indianapolis. Hundreds braved the 103° F. heat wave to see Dillinger’s body
at Harvey Funeral Home on July 25, 1934. The line of onlookers circled
the block twice (Harvey Funeral Home was located on the southeast corner
of Indiana and Harrison Streets).
Hundreds stood in line to see John Dillinger's body at Harvey Funeral Home
(July 25, 1934) (click image to enlarge)
The Indianapolis Star (July 31, 2019) reported that Dillinger's body was scheduled to be exhumed for a documentary on the History Channel, presumably to extract DNA to compare with that of known Dillinger descendants to establish conclusively that the individual buried in the Crown Hill grave is (or isn't) actually John. Crown Hill Cemetery, however, balked at the plan, the History Channel bailed on the project, and a lawsuit ensued (no pun intended). The Indianapolis Star (December 4, 2019) reported that the trial judge ruled Dillinger's body could not be exhumed without Crown Hill's consent. So we may never know for certain whether Dillinger is actually buried in his family's plot at Crown Hill.
File photo from The Indianapolis Star
Some have questioned whether or not John Dillinger was actually shot near Chicago's Biograph Theater in July, 1934. When John's father saw the body, he said it was not his son, but John was said to have had plastic surgery, which might have changed his facial appearance. The FBI stated definitively that Dillinger's body was identified at the time. Not everyone was convinced, however. Investigators Jay Robert Nash and Ron Offen popularized a theory that another person was shot, and that Dillinger escaped and lived into the 1960s. In their book, Dillinger: Dead or Alive? (Chicago: Henry Regnery Co., 1970), Nash and Offen reprinted letters purportedly written by John Dillinger from 1959 and 1963, along with photographs alleging to be Dillinger from that time. Admittedly, there's a strong resemblance in the 1959/1963 photos with Dillinger photos from the early 1930s. The '59/'63 pictures show a sixty-something man whose face (particularly the ears) resembles a younger Johnny D.
Of course, it's possible to find lookalikes for many famous people, so the '59/'63 claimant could simply have been an opportunist attempting to cash-in on a criminal's infamous past. For example, William T. Phillips, a Washington resident who served in prison along with Butch Cassidy, later convinced some of Cassidy's Utah family that he was Cassidy. Butch reportedly died in Bolivia in 1908, and Phillips died in Spokane in 1937. Perhaps Dillinger, too, had an imposter who claimed survival; perhaps Dillinger survived after all. If DNA tests were made of Dillinger's remains, that mystery might be put to rest, but, as it now stands, exhumation seems unlikely.
Learn about the Great Fire of 1842 that consumed nearly all of Mooresville, Indiana, and the amazing acts of generosity that assured the town's resurrection.
Mooresville's Great Fire of 1842
(Mooresville Moments #16)
by Mooresville Public Library
The fire occurred on Tuesday night, November 22, 1842. According to the New York Tribune, the blaze began in the home of James G. Slocum, in which an unidentified woman and three unidentified children were sleeping, and all four tragically died in the inferno. Slocum was apparently away at the time.
The New York Tribune, Friday, December 16, 1842, page 2
(Click images to enlarge)
The New York Tribune article was repeated verbatim in several newspapers, including the following:
The Schenectady (N.Y.) Cabinet, Tuesday, December 20, 1842, page 2
The Boston (MA) Trumpet and Universalist Magazine, Saturday, December 24, 1842, page 3
The Montpelier (VT) Watchman, Friday, December 23, 1842, page 3
The New York Spectator, Wednesday, December 28, 1842, page 46
The identification of Slocum's residence as the start of the conflagration is an amazingly precise detail for a New York City newspaper to relate about a small Indiana village, especially when one considers the following:
Mooresville historian Clara S. Richardson stated that the 1842 fire was "of unknown origin," and she does not mention the Slocums nor any deaths from the fire (page 24 of A Brief History of Mooresville, Indiana, 1824-1974. [1974]. Mooresville, IN: Dickinson Publishing Company--available online here);
No one named Slocum (or with variant spellings, such as Slocumb or Slocom) is buried in any cemeteries in Morgan County, Indiana;
No one named Slocum (or with variant spellings, such as Slocumb or Slocom) was listed as living in Mooresville or Morgan County, Indiana, in the 1840 Federal Census, although a James Slocumb was shown to reside in Monroe County, Indiana in the 1840 and 1850 Federal Censuses and was extensively discussed (spelled as both Slocumb and Slocum) in Charles Blanchard's 1884 historical and biographical sketches of Morgan, Monroe, and Brown Counties (available online here).
No one named Slocum (or with variant spellings, such as Slocumb or Slocom) was mentioned in Almira Harvey Hadley's A Brief History of Mooresville and Vicinity (1918) (available online here) or in Margaret W. Fogleman's Early Mooresville (1884) (available online here) or in John Matthews' Ye Early Pioneers (1875) (available online here) or in The Pioneers of Morgan County: Memoirs of Noah J. Major (1915) (available to checkout from Mooresville Public Library).
So, did the 1842 fire start in James Slocum's home and kill four people? There is no local evidence to support the New York Tribune's claim, but it can't be completely ruled out. The deceased woman and children could have had a different surname (or surnames) than Slocum, and they might have been visiting from another community (to which their remains could have been returned and interred). Thus, looking for Slocums in the county cemeteries or federal censuses would not have identified the fire victims, if they were not named Slocum or came from out-of-town. Nonetheless, the absence of James G. Slocum from the local historical record and U.S. censuses weighs against the Tribune's account, as does the paper's failure to identify the victims. Let's quote from Clara Richardson's Mooresville history: "In 1842 a fire of unknown origin hit Mooresville. Before the fire, there were eleven stores and houses in this wooded area; next morning only the Moore Store and house were left. Trees were cut, burned, houses and shops were deliberately torn apart to try to check the blaze on both sides of the street. Work to construct new homes and stores started immediately, so the story goes." (Page 24 of A Brief History of Mooresville, Indiana, 1824-1974. [1974]. Mooresville, IN: Dickinson Publishing Company--available online here).
Quoting from Margaret W. Fogleman's Early Mooresville:
"About 1842 Mooresville was visited by the greatest fire it has ever known. Beginning with Pa's [Samuel Moore's] store there were ten houses and shops before the fire. Next morning there was Pa's store and our house left. The Dr's [doctor's] shop at the west and a dwelling house at the east were torn down to check the fire." (Early Mooresville [1884] [available online here]). Margaret Fogleman was the daughter of town founder Samuel Moore (and his wife, Eliza Moore).
I'm inclined to give the local sources greater credence than the New York Tribune's account. Perhaps Horace Greeley's reporters enlivened the tale to make for more interesting reading. Clearly, the eastern newspapers that reprinted the story didn't check the facts further.
During December 1842 news of the Mooresville catastrophe was related in several papers across the United States as well as one in England (click images below to enlarge).
The Bristol (England) Mercury & Daily Post, Saturday, 31 December 1842, page 4
The Philadelphia (PA) Saturday Courier, December 17, 1842, page 3,
reprinting the Iowa mistake from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (see below)
The Brooklyn (N.Y.) Daily Eagle, Monday, December 12, 1842, page 2,
which incorrectly placed Mooresville in Iowa
The Charleston (S.C.) Mercury, Tuesday, December 13, 1842, page 2,
reprinting the Iowa mistake from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (see above)
The New York Tribune, Thursday, December 15, 1842, page 1
The Niles National Register, St. Louis, Missouri, Saturday, December 17, 1842, page 16
Some of the accounts quoted the original story that appeared in the Indiana State Sentinel, November 29, 1842, without adjusting for the time delay in printing. For instance, the New York Tribune on December 15, 1842, incorrectly stated that the fire took place "Tuesday night of last week," which would have been December 6, two weeks after it happened. This mistake was repeated in the Charleston (S.C.) Mercury, The Philadelphia (PA) Saturday Courier, and the Brooklyn (N.Y.) Daily Eagle. The Niles National Register was only a week off (reporting November 29 as the fire date, when it was actually the Tuesday before, November 22).
Indiana State Sentinel, November 29, 1842
The fire consumed nearly all of the town, sparing only Samuel Moore's general store and residence on the northeast corner of Main and Indiana Streets in downtown Mooresville. Moore supplied lumber and labor free-of-charge to help citizens rebuild their homes and businesses.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the population of Mooresville, Indiana, was about 1,200. During that time, local businesses employed roughly 2,500 workers, most of whom commuted to town from surrounding communities on the interurban railway. Among the largest employers here were Bolton Sorghum Factory (the world's largest in 1897), the Indiana Brass & Iron Bed Factory, two brick manufacturing facilities, and Fall Creek Furniture Company.
In the following installment of Mooresville Moments, a local history video series, Fall Creek Furniture Company is showcased.
