Texas, where the cattlemen were just
beginning to crowd the buffalo off the
rich unfenced range. The pony ex-
press rider was filling his brief hour
before the coming of the telegraph,
and six-horse stages trailed clouds of
desert dust as they shuttled across the
southwest with passengers and light
freight. The chime whistle of the
locomotive had yet to be heard west
of Omaha.

And into this atmosphere young
Miner found himself — without
money, But he had heard glamorous
tales about California, and hitching
himself to an immigrant train he
arrived on the Pacific slope. Broke in
California he turned his mind to
robbery.

$75,000 Stage Hold-Up at 17

At seventeen he pulled off a $75,000
stage robbery. He made up his mind
that this was his life—and he never
turned back.

He held up stage after stage, and
the Wells Fargo people bent every
effort to catch him. Posses of armed
men scoured the manzanita-clad hills
of California for the lone bandit who
struck with forethought and sudden-
ness—and always got away.

Miner’s successes were due to skil-
ful planning. He studied the country,
used. the best horses, and always made
sure of his escape route. But the lone
wolf’s. luck couldn’t last forever.
Caught when his horse went lame, he
got a long term of imprisonment. For
the next 16 years he was in and out
of California jails, always for the
same crime—stage robbery.

He was never violent, never drank
or smoked, and always had that air
of calm reserve. But underneath the
reserve was a steel will.

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TWENTY-FOURTH EDITION

Bill Miner, alias George Edwards. His record of stage and train robberies spanned fifty years.

It’s now 1879, and at the age of 36
he’s describing himself as A. E. Miner
or W. A. Morgan, or sometimes
George Edwards. Just finished a term
at San Quentin he appeared in Den-
ver, where he teamed up with Bull
Leroy, a desperate character credited
with many successful stage robberies
in the Rocky Mountain region. In
1880 the pair robbed the Del Norte
stage and got $3,600. A sheriff's
posse took after them and the bandits
separated.

Leroy made the mistake of riding
into a box canyon and was caught and
lynched. Miners luck held, he
escaped.

With his share of the proceeds,
Miner went east and lived for a few
months in Onondago, Michigan,
posing as a wealthy California mining
man. He even got himself engaged to

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the belle of the town. But life in
Onondago had a dull flavor compared
to the west, where you had to ride
like hell ahead of the sheriff's bullets!
He left town one day without warn-
ing. A few months later he was back
in Denver.

Now he chose a partner; Stanton
Jones, a reckless gun fighter and cut
throat. But the partnership didn’t last
long. They held up the Del Norte
stage again, were chased and brought
to a stand. Two of the sheriff's depu-

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