The Rondout Train Robbery

On June twelfth of nineteen twenty-four, a gang of bandits pulled off what was then the largest train robbery in American history, right here near Rondout, Illinois. The robbers boarded a Chicago-bound mail train, overwhelmed the crew, and forced postal clerks to hand over sacks stuffed with more than two million dollars in securities and cash. The haul would equal tens of millions today.

Local police quickly apprehended several suspects, and a federal investigation eventually traced the heist to the Newton gang, working with a corrupt postal inspector. The case drew national attention during the height of Prohibition, when organized crime was flush with bootlegging money and bold enough to take on federal mail trains in broad daylight. The Rondout robbery became a landmark in the history of federal law enforcement and mail security.