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And we return to our American stories.

Up next, the story of how one of America's most notorious criminals was caught because of one savvy oil man from Oklahoma.

Here to tell the story of how Machine Gun Kelly was captured, is Joe Urchall, author of The Year of Fear.

And later, as you'll hear, Dr. T. Lindsay Baker, author of A Gangster Tour of Texas and numerous other books.

Let's get into the story. Here's Joe Urshall to start us all.

The story takes place in 1933. The unemployment rate was up to 40%.

Thousands of banks were closed.

Catastrophic dust storms were beginning to kick up across the southwest and the Midwest.

They'd blow so hard and so strong with so much fine silt that the people who lived in that area

would have to do things like drape their child's beds and

carriages with wet sheets just to prevent the silt from coming in and choking them to

death. It would blow so far that it would turn snow red into England, kill livestock

in the fields. While all this is going out of course, FDR takes office and announces that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

At the very same time, an incredible spate of kidnappings begin occurring across the country.

With the banks drying up, the bank robbing business isn't as good as it used to be.

And an estimated 2,000 kidnappings occurred between 1930 and 1933.

Companies were issuing kidnapping insurance. People in Hollywood were driving around in armor-plated

limousines with armed guards in the passenger seat. They would snatch a wealthy individual,

ransom them, and then release them with the caveat that everything would be fine unless they go to the

authorities. If they do go to the authorities, we'll return and kill you, not only you, but all the members of your family as well.

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