Okeene, Oklahoma

The Al Jennings Gang was short lived. They committed only one or two train robberies in 1897 and lasted only four months or less. Al Jennings, the leader was a lawyer and had been County Attorney for Canadian County, Oklahoma.
The gang included Al’s brother Frank Jennings; the O’Malley Brothers; and Morris, Pat, and Dick West. Stories of the train robberies vary from the account that all they got was $3.00 to one less believable report of around $10,000. The gang was captured and sentenced to five years in jail.

Al Jennings spent almost all the time in jail, and for a while his cellmate was the famous writer Sidney Porter, better known as O’ Henry. Al had been sentenced to 50 years, but the president pardoned him in five and he returned to society. Here Al Jennings soon capitalized on his outlaw days writing Through the Shadows with O’ Henry and Beating Back as well as expanding the tales of his outlaw days until it is hard to find which is truth and which his own fantasy. Enough publicity was obtained for the movies to use Al in the story of his life. Al Jennings also made history by running for governor of Oklahoma in 1914 and running a pretty good race coming in third on the Democratic primary.

An article located on the Oklahombres web site contained the following information on Al Jennings later life.

The Al Jennings movie “Beating Back” was sufficient to get Al accepted into the motion picture industry. In a world of pretense, the pretender is at home; and Al did find a home in southern California, as Hollywood developed. He assumed the role of technical director of western films and was accepted as an authority of the old west gunfighter.

After World War II, another movie, “Al Jennings of Oklahoma,” was made of his life. Again, he was portrayed as a brave man of gallant deeds. Al enjoyed the life provided by Hollywood and lived in that locale until is death in 1961, at the age of 98.

Originally printed in the “Blaine County Economic Base Report” prepared by the Research & Planning Division, Will J. Bowman, Chief; Bill Hunter, Assistant Chief and Harry Revelle Jr., Analyst; Writer