ANDERSON — On Cross Street sits a house that was built around 1926. Down the hill sits the present day Coon Hunter’s Club.
Rumor has it that there was a speakeasy where nationally known acts would perform. Dancing and drink went on during a time when Prohibition was at its peak.
The present owners of the home are Phil and Judy Sells. They were informed by former owners Paul and Sylvnia Kellums, who lived there for 47 years and are now deceased, that John Dillinger stored liquor in the basement. The basement became the speakeasy.
“It was a nightclub and had important acts at the time, the Kellums told us,” said Sells. “There was another speakeasy on the corner of Hill Street and Cross Street that was also supplied liquor.”
The house was out in the country; land around it wasn’t developed yet.
Sells also says his wife, Judy, used to work at the former Commercial Bank in Daleville — the same one that was robbed in July 17, 1933, by Dillinger.
A thrown satchel
ANDERSON — Jim and Betty Garringer tell a tale involving Jim’s dad, Isaac Jacob Garringer. The senior Garringer was Edgewood town marshal in the 1930s and may have had a close encounter with Dillinger.
“My dad got a call from the local sheriff reporting that Dillinger was headed out of town on State Road 32 at the time. There were the two towers (Tower Road) where the Interurban railroad ran through and people would wait to get on the trolley there.”
Garringer was just a baby at the time that Dillinger robbed the Commercial Bank in Daleville. The older Garringer made it there just in time to see something thrown out the window, landing in one of the towers. It was a satchel that might have been used in the bank robbery. Dillinger had sped through too fast to be caught.
“The local newspaper at the time reported that a lone gunman had robbed a bank,” Garringer said. “I had heard that at the old State Police Post there was the satchel with my dad’s name on it as the person who recovered it, but when I went to find out more, the post had been closed down.”
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Dillinger: A local speakeasy
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