By Fred Steiner
Guest Columnist
Bluffton favorite son Charles Triplehorn died Aug. 25. His remarkable professional career is noted in his obituary. Aside from his achievements in science, he was witness to two remarkable events during his lifetime.
He is possibly the only person with such an unusual claim to fame. He witnessed Bluffton’s John Dillinger bank robbery in August of 1933, and he attended the famous Snow Bowl football game in Columbus, played by Ohio State and Michigan.
Several years ago, during a visit to Bluffton, I invited Charles to write down his version of both accounts.
As he modestly states, “All of this left a lasting impression on me, and over the years has been a great conversation piece.”
Seriously understated, Charles was no doubt the life of every party he ever attend.
Both accounts are in the book “Bluffton Anthology – A Creek Runs Through It.”
His Dillinger account follows: Our chat with Charles about his John Dillinger experience took place in the doorway of what is today Do It Best Family Hardware, 109 N. Main St., and the Edward Jones office, 111 N. Main St.
At the time of our conversation, in 2007, he was the last living eyewitness to Bluffton’s Citizens National Bank robbery pulled off by Dillinger and his gang.
He was in Bluffton attending a Bluffton High School class of 1945 reunion. We stood between the two businesses because that’s where Charles stood at noon on Aug. 17, 1933.
We should point out that the Bluffton News editor, Ted Biery, on the other side of the street, also witnessed the event. He wrote an excellent account of what happened. His opening paragraph sets the scene as only a journalism graduate — he was a 1913 Ohio State journalism graduate — could craft. His writing has accuracy, brevity and clarity:
“Staging a bold daylight robbery, five well-dressed bandits held up the Citizens National Bank at South Main and Church streets at noon Monday and escaped in an auto with loot of $2,100. The loss is covered by insurance.”
Here’s what Charles remembered:
“I was, indeed, a witness to the John Dillinger robbery. Bear in mind that I was only 6 years old.
“Being almost three-fourth of a century ago, so much of what I recall is somewhat hazy and probably modified and embellished by retelling. On that fateful day, my mother sent me to stay with Fred and Zoe Zehrbach, probably to get me out of her hair for a while.
“Zehrbachs lived in an upstairs apartment above what was then Barnes’ Grocery, in the next block from the bank. I ambled along Main Street, passed the bank – obviously Dillinger was inside as I walked by – crossed Church Street and was in front of Greding’s Hardware when the shooting began.
“Greding’s had a display of cane fishing poles in front of the store right next to the entrance to the Zehrbach apartment. Fred was awaiting my arrival so he was right there, grabbed me and pulled me into the entrance of his place.
“From there, we were able to watch what was going on by peeking around the cane poles. The entire episode lasted only a few minutes.
“I distinctly remember one of the Dillinger men standing in the intersection brandishing a machine gun as though he were directing traffic. He sprayed a few rounds at random to make certain that there were no interruptions of the activity inside the bank.
“All at once two men dashed out of the bank firing pistols, jumped in a car, picked up their lookout and roared away out of town toward Findlay. All of this left a lasting impression on me, and over the years has been a great conversation piece.
“There are several amusing anecdotes associated with the Dillinger robbery. One involved my grandmother’s brother, M.M. (Dode) Murray, who was postmaster on duty at the post office, directly across Main Street from the bank.
“Someone yelled, ‘Dode, they’re robbing the bank.’ Dode grabbed a gun, darted out and positioned himself behind a brick pillar in front of the post office. He poked his head around the pillar to assess the situation, and was an easy target with his snow white hair.
“The mobster in the street fired a warning shot, and Dode remained stolidly behind the pillar until well after the getaway. Another comedy of errors involved the Bluffton volunteer fire department.
“An alarm was somehow sounded and the firemen assuming it was a fire, assembled at the town hall in which the fire truck was garaged. The truck pulled out of the garage, started the siren and turned the corner onto Main Street.
“Someone spotted the lookout – who may have fired a warning shot – whereupon they quickly backed the truck back to the garage.
“Another interesting sidelight was that Dr. Jesse Steiner had his office directly above the bank. Dr. Steiner was a big game hunter and had a number of weapons in his office, along with a collection of stuffed animals. He could have easily picked off the robbers from his window.
“There you have my recollections for what they are worth. Evan Herr, a classmate, had a bullet from one of the guns used in the robbery. His father, Nelson Herr, worked in the bank and picked up the bullet after things returned to normal.”
(More than 40 shots were fired in both directions of Main Street by the gang, using revolvers and a sub-machine gun that sprayed bullets.)
With the OSU-Michigan Snow Bowl, the Bluffton Triplehorn brothers, Charles, John and Don,attended the 1950 Ohio State-Michigan snow bowl. Charles said his brother, John, was being recruited to play football for the Buckeyes and watched the game from the bench.
When John went to Columbus, he brought Don, who was in graduate school at OSU at the time, some frozen rabbits.
John sat with the rabbits throughout the game. It was so bitterly cold that the rabbits never thawed out.
Here’s a conversation we had with Charles about the snow bowl:
“I was 16 and a Bluffton Boy Scout at the time. We went to the game to usher fans to their seats. My memory of the details is weak, but, my brother, John, knew the story very well. Besides John and Bruce Hauenstein, I don’t remember who else was there. Harry Kettlewell, math teacher at Bluffton High School and maybe our scoutmaster, may have been the driver.
“We wore our scout uniforms, somewhat unsuitable for blizzard conditions. Tarps were put on the field before the game, but that became a problem when the snow continued to fall and became deeper and deeper on the field.
“Volunteers were recruited to sweep off the snow and roll up the tarps. I don’t remember volunteering, but we were out there with a sizable number of folks. The tarps had to be cut into smaller pieces, and some of it was frozen to the ground.
“Picture a line of poorly dressed, snow-covered guys shoulder-to-shoulder pushing a tarp full of snow that got several feet high. One person got carried over the top and almost rolled up. The wind was blowing, visibility was down to 10 yards or so, and as a result, it was not easy to stop the momentum once we were rolling.
“This person was lucky that his situation was noticed, and he was saved. This may have spawned the later rumor that one of the Boy Scouts was missing, but this turned out to be false.
“My personal memory was of a dense snowfall of large wet aggregates of snow that stuck to you. Specifically, when you blink the snow would freeze your eyebrows to your face and suddenly your eyelids were stuck. Easily cured by rubbing your eyes, but somewhat startling: never has this happened to me before or since.
“Back up in the stands, I remember the wind and the cold. The game itself was hard to follow and not very interesting. It contained lots of clashes of two mobs on the line of scrimmage alternating with punting – lots of punting, because it was the only way to move the ball downfield.
“People fell down a lot on the slippery field, and passing was absurd; Michigan did not complete any, and I don’t know about OSU.
“Michigan won on a touchdown scored as a result of a blocked punt that went out of bounds behind the goal line. I don’t remember leaving the stadium, but we headed north in a continuing blizzard. The flat land north of Columbus became so uniform that you couldn’t tell where the road was.
“Not too far out of town we pulled into the driveway of a farmhouse and were quickly followed by several other cars. I read that 20,000 cars were on Ohio roads. So, a bunch of us — I don’t know how many — spent the night on the floor, guests of the generous residents.
“Next morning came the need to feed all these people. Fortunately a semitrailer full of baked goods was stalled just in front of the house, and the driver opened up the back and provided food for all of us.
“The snow and wind stopped during the night, and in the morning the sun came out and snowplows opened the roads, so we continued homewards without further delay.
“What a day.”
Fred Steiner lives in Bluffton. His column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Lima News editorial board or AIM Media, owner of The Lima News.
