Peggy Jo Tallas

Peggy Jo Tallas
Caught by a security camera in 1992
Born	June 6, 1944 Kaufman, Texas, U.S.
Died	May 5, 2005 Tyler, Texas, U.S.
Cause of death	Gunshot wounds
Other names	Cowboy Bob
Height	5 ft 10 in (177 cm)

Peggy Jo Tallas (June 6, 1944 – May 5, 2005)^[1] was an American bank robber who would cross-dress as a man to conceal her identity, earning her the media epithet Cowboy Bob for always sporting a white ten-gallon hat.^[2] She robbed a total of five banks in Texas between 1991 and 1992 before she was caught by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but as Tallas never used a weapon during her robberies, she received a light sentence of 33 months. In 2005, after living quietly for the past decade, she committed suicide by cop after police caught up to her escaping the scene of her final bank robbery.^[3]

Her own story is to be filmed as Peggy Jo by Phillip Noyce in which she will be played by Lily James.^[4] Her story was theatricalized by Buntport Theater and square product theatre in their 2014 play Peggy Jo & the Desolate Nothing.^[5] A Cowboy Bob musical was produced at the Alley Theatre in 2023.^[6][7]

Biography

Peggy Jo Tallas was born in Kaufman, TX on June 6, 1944. Tallas was the youngest of three children to Pete and Helen Tallas. Tallas faced tragedy at a young age, at four years old her father died of cancer. As a result, her mother was forced to get a job as a nurse aide to support their family. Unlike her siblings, Tallas was a free-spirited teenager and dropped out of high school in the tenth grade. Tallas' childhood friend, Karen Jones, recalls, one day Tallas hopped in her car and decided to drive to San Francisco because she wanted to see what life was like there. Her favorite movie was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Tallas was constantly on the go, and always looking for new adventures. In her twenties, she moved to North Dallas and got a job as a receptionist downtown at a Marriott Hotel. While working at the Marriott, she met another receptionist named Cherry Young and they became very close friends. Young noted that Tallas had no desire to get married or have children soon, nor did she think about a career or money. One afternoon the two were driving and they passed a Wells Fargo armored truck, and Tallas made a comment saying, “You know, I could go rob that and not have to worry about anything for a while.” Young laughed not thinking twice about Tallas ever doing such a thing.

Many years passed, and Tallas’s friends were all married but a bad experience with a man left a bad taste in her mouth steering her away from all men. In 1977, Tallas was booked for car theft in Tarrant County. In 1984, she moved with her mother Helen to a Dallas suburb to help care for her, as she had fallen ill with a degenerative bone disease. The medical bills kept rising, and Tallas felt like she was falling behind and could not catch up, and she was too proud to ask for help. Young explained that it was likely that Tallas felt as if her “life was slipping away”, and she was "losing her wild side".^[8]

Bank robberies

In May 1991, wearing a pair of men’s pants, a dark men’s shirt, a brown leather jacket, a fake beard, aviator sunglasses, oversized riding boots and a cowboy hat, Tallas walked into an American Federal Bank in Irving, Texas. She kept her head down, walked to the teller, and slid her a note saying, “This is a bank robbery, Give me your money. No marked bills or dye packs.” The teller handed her the money as her instructions stated and Tallas walked out with a stack of cash without anyone else noticing. After her first success, Tallas continued to rob banks all around the Dallas area, as well as Garland and Mesquite, using the same tactics, gaining herself the name of Cowboy Bob. She was careful to not make small mistakes and left FBI’s Steve Powell with little to no leads. In September 1992, after many robberies Tallas committed two robberies in one day and used her personal license plate which was traced back to Tallas and Helen’s apartment. It was there that all her schemes were finally uncovered. Powell admitted that he never considered the possibility that Cowboy Bob could be a woman. Tallas was sentenced to 33 months in prison. After her sentence, she would return home to her mother and continue to care for her, until she passed in December of 2002.^[9] Tallas always had a dream of going down to Padre Island or Mexico to live out the rest of her life.

Death

On May 5, 2005, Tallas arrived at the Guaranty Bank in Tyler, Texas in her RV and said to the young teller, “This is a robbery. I need all of your money. Don’t set any alarms.” Tallas got the money but failed to check for a dye pack that exploded when she left the bank. The smoke caught the attention of pedestrians, and law enforcement was notified and they were sent to find her in her RV where she was surrounded. Tallas walked out with her toy pistol urging police that they’d have to kill her. When they refused, she pulled out her toy pistol and they immediately shot her dead.^[3] She is now buried in Kaufman Cemetery in her hometown, where she will forever be known as Cowboy Bob.^[10][2]

References

External links

• Peggy Jo Tallas – episode 3 of Addicted to the Life

This biographical article related to crime is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

• v
• t
• e