Bonnie and Clyde Ambush Museum

In North America, the 1930’s were a time of sexy, roguish criminals, and none were sexier than Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow.

The couple captivated the country as they galavanted around robbing, stealing, and shooting. While their legend, even at the time, was much more glamorous than their reality, their crime spree encapsulated the “public enemy era” and their love affair couldn’t help but turn into a modern-day Romeo and Juliet story, which ended just as a current Shakespearean tragedy would, in a hail of bullets and blood.

Eight miles south of Gibsland on Highway 154/Par Road 300 is a monument marking the spot of the epic shootout that ended the couple’s reign of Texan terror. Much like the car the two outlaws died in, the memorial stone has seen better days, riddled with bullets and defaced almost past recognition. 

The museum is managed by L.J. “Boots” Hinton, who happens to be the son of one of the several gunmen who took the two criminals out as they sat in their vehicle. The building it’s housed in used to be a cafe, allegedly the last place Bonnie and clyde visited before heading down the road to their doom. “They got two sandwiches to go, went down the road eight miles, and got killed,” according to Hinton, who also claims Bonnie died with that very sandwich in her hand.

Besides the gruesome photos of the two dead in the bullet riddled car, the museum is fairly family-friendly and cartoonish. The actual death car is displayed in a casino in Las Vegas, but Gibsland still has some decent artifacts, including a replica of the car, some of their firearms, Bonnie’s red hat, replicas of the couple’s tombstones, and glass from the windshield of the death car.