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Newspaper editor John Newman Edwards outdid himself in the fall of 1873.

He had moved from one side of the state to the other, from the Kansas City Times to the St. Louis Dispatch.

And after the first train robbery by the James boys, Edwards went all out for his new employer.

He produced a supplemental section that was 20 pages long.

The entire thing was about the bank robbing, train robbing outlaws of Missouri.

And 11 pages were devoted to Frank and Jesse.

Edwards performed a dazzling high wire act in his supplemental.

He described the actions of the bandits in glowing terms.

He slathered on loads of praise for their daring exploits.

He basically called them heroes.

And then he also said that Frank and Jesse were not the men who had committed all those crimes that were daring and heroic.

It was an incredible balancing act.

On one hand, he clearly admired and championed the actions of the bandits.

And he heavily inferred that they were Frank and Jesse.

On the other hand, he stated plainly that the bandits who did all those things were not Frank and Jesse.

Somehow, Frank and Jesse were daring and courageous bandits and innocent of all crimes at the same time.

It's hard to understand how he did it, but Edwards pulled it off.

And all of this happened before the James Younger gang really got started.

For the next two years, they would be almost unstoppable.

But that didn't mean they were untouchable.

The Pinkerton Detective Agency was hell-bent on bringing them down.

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