Infamous America - MANHUNT Ep. 1 | Claude Dallas: “The Trapper”

Episode Date: November 10, 2021

Claude Dallas was an old school cowboy in the 20th century. He drifted through the American West and worked at a series of ranches … but he was also on the run from the law. He spent long periods of time alone in the wilderness as a trapper, and when he disregarded hunting and trapping laws, he set up a deadly showdown with wildlife conservation officers. Take advantage of SimpliSafe’s holiday sale! For a limited time, get 40% off your new system at SimpliSafe.com/infamous Get 20% your first purchase of Papa & Barkley CBD products at papaandbarkleycbd.com/infamous Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join For more details, please visit www.blackbarrelmedia.com. Our social media pages are: @blackbarrelmedia on Facebook and Instagram, and @bbarrelmedia on Twitter. This show is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please visit AirwaveMedia.com to check out other great podcasts like Ben Franklin’s World, Once Upon A Crime, and many more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The American Northwest is quiet. Sometimes out in the desert, it's quiet enough to hear yourself breathing. It's quiet enough to hear yourself think. And that was just the way the young cowboy Claude Dallas liked it. The long days out on the range could be punishing. There was always work to do on a sprawling ranch, even if it was in solitude on the farthest reaches of the spread. But this was the life for Claude, the life of a Buccaroo.

And even though he liked the solitude of riding the range and sleeping under the stars, it was still nice to enjoy the silence of the area from the comfort of his bed every now and then. And that was where he was now, lying on his bed in a bunkhouse on a ranch in Elko County, Nevada. The gigantic county occupies the entire northeast corner of Nevada, where the state borders Utah on the east and Idaho on the north. It's straight north of Las Vegas by about 300 miles, but couldn't be more different from the glitz and glamour of the strip. Here in 1973, Las Vegas was arguably at the peak of its early years.

The dunes and the sands were popular hotels. So were the Sahara, the Desert Inn, the Flamingo, and Caesar's Palace. Elvis Presley, Tony Bennett, Frank Sinatra, and Wayne Newton were some of the headliners. but for a drifting cowboy up in Elko County, the 24-hour mayhem of lights and noise of Las Vegas would have been as foreign as something out of a science fiction novel. Claude lay on his bed in the bunkhouse, enjoying the silence of a desert ranch

that couldn't be conceived of by a person who strolled down Las Vegas Boulevard. He'd been in northern Nevada for a couple years now, and lots of drifting ranch hands had come and gone during his time. And that's who he assumed, opened the door to the bunkhouse now, a couple new cowboys who joined the outfit. But when Claude looked at the three new arrivals, it was clear they weren't cowboys. One of the three asked Claude to confirm his name. He stood up from his bunk and answered in the affirmative. He was Claude Lafayette, Dallas, Jr. The Inquisitor told Claude that the three men were from the

FBI, and Claude was under arrest. They'd been looking for him for years, and they were here to take him back east. Claude went willingly. He didn't put up a fight, and he didn't try to escape. But it was the last time those two things would be true. That was just the first of three big encounters with law enforcement for Claude Dallas and the first of three manhunts. In the next two, he wouldn't go quietly or easily. From Black Barrel Media, this is infamous America. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer. In this season, we're telling two stories of American manhunt. across six episodes. This is story number one, episode one, the Trapper. Claude wasn't older than 10 when he got his first gun, a shotgun. It was a gift from his father.

That was back in the late 1950s or early 1960s. Claude's family were dairy farmers who had recently moved from the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia to Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The area where the Dallas family settled was a sparsely populated Woodland County. It was perfect for hunting, which Claude loved. With his new shotgun, Claude explored the wilderness around his home, and before long he returned with his first kill, a deer. From his early days, Claude was an independent young man.

All those hours spent hunting had acclimated him to long stretches of time spent alone and away from society. Not that that was a problem. Claude seemed to prefer solitude. It was also possible that this alone time was a welcome reprieve from his father's dairy farm. Claude didn't care much for milking cows. But Claude didn't spend all of his free time hunting.

He was an avid reader as well. He loved stories of the American West. He devoured tales of outlaws, cowboys, frontiersmen, trappers, and hunters like him. It didn't matter if it was fiction or nonfiction. If it was about the American West, Claude read it. Just a few years after arriving in Michigan,

the Dallas family moved again. This time they moved south to Morrow County, Ohio. Claude continued to hunt as he worked his way through high school. When he graduated, Claude decided it was time to hike out on his own, and naturally he headed west. But it wasn't just his love of the Old West that drove him to see the region he'd been reading about for years. There was another reason, which revealed itself a couple years later. For now, he paid a visit to his sister who lived in San Jose, California. From there, he planned to go to Canada or Alaska. But when he heard there was work in Oregon at a ranch called the Alvord, he decided to take a detour.

Claude arrived in southeastern Oregon in the spring of 1968. According to one account, he was discovered by the roadside, walking by himself, wearing a heavy pack. Coincidentally, the man who met Claude on the road was a hand at the Alvord Ranch. The ranch hand wasn't surprised when Claude asked if there was any work available. At a ranch as big and as well-known as the Alvord, with enough acreage to accommodate thousands of head of cattle, the operation always needed labor and steadied labor at that. So the hand encouraged Claude to go to the ranch and check. As it happened, there was an opening, and Claude was given a chance to prove himself. But that's not to say he didn't make an impression immediately.

He was small and looked shy, and the family in charge noticed how quiet he was. He was polite, and he would speak when spoken to. He told him his name and where he was from, and that he was a quick learner, but he never said more than a few words at a time. He hired on right then and there, and started work the next morning. He proved to be every bit as capable as he claimed. The demands of a dairy farm were different from the demands of a ranch, but Claude's experience on his family farm came in handy all the same. He finished his first batch of chores days ahead of schedule and proved himself to be a dependable hand.

The ranch decided to keep him around a little longer. His next job was to ride fence. Claude had to scout the perimeter of the grazing land on horseback and mend the fences where they were broken. It was long, hard work. It could be dangerous too. Sometimes it involves setting up camp in the mountains. alone, and working quickly so that the cattle could safely graze there a couple weeks later.

But Claude didn't mind the danger or the work or the isolation. In fact, he volunteered to do it. After those experiences, he was officially added to the roster of the Alvord Ranch. He graduated from mending fences to herding cattle, and that was when the full persona of an Old West cowboy came out. He bought clothes that would have been fashionable in the previous century, like a high dome, wide-brimmed hat. He used Spanish words for the cattle and the tools he encountered on the ranch. He already had a special interest in guns, and now he started carrying a sidearm. Some of the other ranch hands thought Claude was trying too hard to impress,

and they teased him or cracked jokes behind his back. But none of Claude's behaviors changed the quality of his work. He might have dressed like he was in the late 1860s instead of the late 1960s, but his work ethic fit with the cowboys of both eras, and he was still held in high regard. And like those drifting riders of old, Claude felt the need to keep moving, to keep seeing and exploring, and his time at the Alvord Ranch came to an end. Over time, the American Northwest fell under the control of large industries like mining and agriculture. And the northwest we're talking about here is the eastern part of what could be considered the American northwest.

It's not the area with thick forests of tall pine trees that gets lots of rainfall. That's a relatively narrow strip of land along the west coast. As you move inland from the beaches and cliffs and trees of Oregon, Washington, and California, you get into a region that's high desert. In some places, it's full of amazing mountains and rivers and lakes and trees. trees. In other places, it's relatively flat, but has enough scrub grass to raise cattle. And in other places, it's nothing but barren, hard-packed earth that's been cracked, beaten, and bleached by the sun. Claude Dallas's life was spent roaming these three types of places.

And as large-scale industrial production ramped up in the area, the desire, as always, was for bigger operations, faster machines, and newer technology. Claude Dallas, who stepped eagerly into the role of the gentleman cowboy, wanted the opposite. He was a dying breed, and he craved a lifestyle that was long out of fashion, so he kept moving in search of it. In 1970, a little less than two years after he arrived, Claude left the Alvord Ranch. On his way out, he bought two horses, one to ride and the other to carry provisions. He drifted through the desert that lay between Oregon, Idaho, and the northern reaches of Nevada, stopping to take odd jobs along the way or just crashed somewhere for a few weeks.

When he'd gotten his fill, he'd set out again. Cars passed him on the road. He was a lone cowboy riding a horse and leading another behind. He looked like an endangered species. After a few months of wandering, he settled in Paradise Hill, an unincorporated community in Humboldt County, Nevada. Claude made a strong impression in Paradise Hill, like he had everywhere else he'd been.

His personal style was a little dramatic, but he was otherwise seen as a capable, resourceful cow hand and generally pleasant to be around. Claude became a fixture of the community. He spent much of his time at a bar owned and operated by a man named George Nielsen. George and Claude were of different temperaments. George was extroverted and talkative and constantly made jokes for or about the customers in his bar.

Claude was quiet and preferred to spend time by himself. George would go drink for drink with his regulars. Claude was only a moderate drinker. He'd once said to a friend that all the good buccaroos I know are either dead or alcoholics. But differences aside, Claude and George became friends. It was a quasi-father-son relationship.

Claude moved into a trailer on George's property and slept there when he wasn't out working. The pair spent long hours talking and paling around. Over time, George and his wife Liz considered Claude just another part of the family. While it seemed to be a case of opposites attract, George and Claude did have one thing in common, a distaste for authority. George frequently joked in his bar about shooting law enforcement officials, and it wasn't uncommon for Claude to joke about the same. George got a kick of winding people up,

and Claude generally held a dim view of regulations. While working with other cowboys on cattle drives, Claude frequently shot deer for meat. Some of the cowboys recalled that, in addition to the fact that Claude was killing deer out of season, it was unnecessary. There was plenty of food to last the whole drive. As much as Claude wanted to pretend he was living in the 1870s, he wasn't.

The need to kill your own dinner was all but non-existent. The Cowboys at the time could never have recognized it as an early sign of a trend, but it was. Claude was about to leave behind the life of a drifting cowboy and throw himself full-time into hunting and trapping, and he had very little respect for regulations or the people who enforced them. But before he could start the new phase of his life, he had to deal with three men from the FBI who were paid to enforce a regulation that virtually everyone hated.

From 1964 to 1973, the U.S. military drafted around 2 million young men for service in the Vietnam War. The draft lottery started December 1, 1969, when Claudeau, Dallas was 19 years old. Several accounts say that the draft was the reason Claude left Ohio after graduating high school, and partially the reason he left the Alvord Ranch. If there hadn't been a draft or a war, he probably would have gone west anyway. But it's also probable that at least part of the reason why he drifted from place to place and job to job was to avoid the draft. He couldn't afford to stay in one place for very long, because there was a warrant out for his arrest. He had failed to show up for induction, and now the authorities were officially pursuing him.

The FBI was on the hunt, but couldn't track him past Oregon. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, it was obviously much easier to live a life off the grid, to use the popular phrase. And with Claude's chosen lifestyle and mode of travel, it was even easier for him to become a ghost. The FBI suspected he was somewhere in the northwest, but according to one account, they didn't have any real clues until they stumbled upon one totally by chance. The source was National Geographic of all things.

The popular magazine with the instantly recognizable yellow borders was immensely popular. In addition to the monthly magazine, it published books. And in 1972, one of those books was called the American Cowboy in Life and Legend. One of the book's many color photographs featured a young man who looked to be about 22 years old, posing an old school Western attire. And it was Claude Dallas.

The FBI used a magazine to track Claude to northern Nevada, and in November 1973, they sent three agents to collect him. Claude was a drifter who was good with guns, and the agents thought he might open fire. or make a run for it. But when the three men strode into the bunk house in Elko County, they found him alone lying on his bed. They announced themselves and asked him to confirm his identity. He did, and they took him into custody peacefully. They shipped him back to Ohio to be tried for draft dodging. But when Claude's case was examined, the authorities

dropped the charges due to a technicality. By law, the local draft board was supposed to send a second notice that Claude was supposed to report for induction. That hadn't happened, which meant Claude's arrest amounted to an improper procedure. So, two months after his arrest, Claude was set free. He returned to Nevada in early 1974. His feelings about the police and the government were already negative, and the fiasco with the draft board and the FBI soured him further. He claimed he was abused, the illegal.

entire way to Ohio. He said FBI agents promised that they would find a way to nab him for good even after he was released. According to some accounts, Claude made a promise to himself. He would never let law enforcement get the jump on him again. Claude was a working cowboy for about five years, but when he returned to Nevada, he decided to make a career change. He picked something familiar, and the new career gave him even more of the solitude he craved. He decided to go into trapping. A person could make a meager living by catching game animals. In Claude's area, the top prize was usually bobcats, but Claude cast a wide net for all kinds of creatures. Because he was so often camped out in the wilderness, he kept some of the meat for himself.

Then he went into Paradise Hill or to local auctions and sold the park. peltz. It was a lucrative industry. In a good season, a trapper could make hundreds or even thousands of dollars. But because it was a lucrative industry, competition could be crowded. It also meant that to get ahead, some people trapped illegally, either out of season or without a license, or with equipment that was prohibited by state law. The thing that Claude never understood or never really cared about was balance. Civilization required balance with nature. If a certain animal was over-trapped in one season, it could mean a smaller population the next season, and the next, and the next. It also meant that other animals could over-populate and cause a whole new

set of problems for both nature and farmers and ranchers. Such practices could throw the entire area out of balance, but maintaining balance required precision. And according to some local trappers, precision was not one of Claude's qualities. Rather than picking just the right spot to lay his traps, Claude laid them all over an area, as though he were casting a drag net. It also meant he worked much harder to hide his traps instead of laying them in naturally obscured places. Sometimes veteran trappers offered advice to Claude. With a little help, Claude could streamline his operation.

and bring in more kills with less work. But Claude refused. He preferred to do things his own way, even if others saw it as inefficient. According to one trapper, Claude spent an entire winter in the mountains and only had a dozen or so bobcat pelts to show for it. More severely, it was said that Claude would shoot wild horses,

keep the meat for himself, and used a hide to bait traps for coyotes. Claude's philosophy of life began to crystallize. It was simple. Society didn't owe Claude, and he didn't owe it back. He had gone through the process of becoming a licensed trapper, but that was it. He preferred to be left alone, and that included being left to hunt and trap how he saw fit, regardless of the regulations. And Claude wasn't alone in his point of view. Others in Paradise Hill had similar thoughts. They felt they were in a tricky situation. Much of the day-to-day business of ranching, hunting, and trapping took place on public land,

which was subject to regulation, either from the Federal Bureau of Land Management or from state and local authorities. But in Claude's view, as well as the views of others, those regulations did nothing but interfere with the livelihoods of the locals. Claude lived and trapped by his own rules. And as he became more of a renegade hunter and trapper, he had more run-ins with the law. The trapping industry is regulated down to the fraction of an inch. But the general idea is simple.

If you're trying to catch smaller animals, you have to use smaller traps. If you're trying to catch larger animals, you have to use larger traps. Some traps have to be outfitted with special equipment that will allow non-game animals to escape if they happen to stumble into the trap. And there are rules about the type of bait you can use and where you can place it. Claude Dallas regularly ignored the laws,

and he started receiving visits from the game wardens who patrolled the trapping grounds. Game wardens, or more officially conservation officers, are members of law enforcement. They're deputized by state agencies to stop poachers, manage animal populations and enforce hunting and trapping laws. And Claude's confrontations with game wardens started in 1976. Claude received a citation for a line of traps that had been baited with illegal animal parts. The warden found Claude's camp, gave him the ticket, and confiscated the traps.

But it wasn't a huge deal. Claude paid the fine and got his traps back. In 1978, he said another line. line of illegal traps in the bloody run hills, a range in northern Nevada. Shortly thereafter, they were found by a different game warden, a man named Gene Weller. Weller was known throughout Humboldt County for being polite yet firm. He took his work seriously and kept a close eye on the hunting and trapping community. He regularly took long walks through the Nevada wilderness to inspect traps.

While patrolling the bloody run hills, Weller stumbled upon Claude's traps. Unfortunately for Weller, there were no tags on the traps, which meant they couldn't be traced back to their owner. So, Weller disabled the traps and left his business card in the hope that he had an opportunity to identify the owner and issue a citation. Weller returned to the hills the next day to see if the illegal traps had been removed. moved, or better yet, to catch their owner. As Weller drove into the area, he saw an orange Jeep parked at an entry point to the hills. He stopped to inspect it. Without getting out of his car,

he saw that the Jeep was unoccupied, and more importantly, he was able to make out a person in the distance. It was potentially his trapper. Weller decided to do a stakeout. He waited for several hours, but no one showed up at the Jeep. Weller gave up waiting and inspected the vehicle. He called for backup, and when they arrived, they all found two firearms in the Jeep, a rifle and a pistol. Ordinarily, that wasn't a problem, but there was a shell inside the rifle. It was a violation of local laws to have a loaded rifle in a car. The guns looked pretty expensive. Weller suspected that whoever owned them would probably come look at. for them. So he confiscated the firearms and held them at the sheriff's office in Winnemucka.

Sure enough, Claude appeared at the sheriff's office a few days later, demanding that his guns be returned to him. He was able to reclaim them, but not before receiving a warning from Weller about his traps. Technically, there was nothing to prove conclusively that the traps belonged to Claude, but Weller had his suspicions. Claude said that all of his traps were above board, and that if Weller wanted to, he could come back out in a week and see for himself. But then Claude issued a warning. Weller could come into Claude's camp if he liked, but he would have to leave his badge outside. A lawman on official duty was not welcome, no matter what the regulations said. Gene Weller didn't have any more run-ins with Claude Dallas, but other

conservation officers did. Two years after the incident in Bloody Run Hills, there was a deadly confrontation in southwestern Idaho. And for a while, every agency in the western United States was hunting Claude Dallas. Next week on Infamous America, Claude sets up a remote campsite, but it's not remote enough. Game wardens investigate his potentially illegal operation, in a tense situation quickly escalates from words to gunshots. That's next week on Infamous America.

And members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials. Sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website, blackbarrelmedia.com. Memberships began at just $5 per month. This season was co-executive produced by Steve Walters

in association with ritual productions. Research and writing by Dante Flores. Original music by Rob Valier. Audio editing and sound design by Dave Harrison. I'm your host and producer, Chris Wimmer. Find us at our website, blackbarrelmedia.com or on our social media channels. We're Black Barrel Media on Facebook and Instagram and B-Barrell Media on Twitter. And you can stream all our episodes on YouTube.

Just search for Infamous America Podcast. This show is part of the Airwave Media Podcast Network. Please visit airwavemedia.com to check out other great podcasts like Ben Franklin's World, Once Upon a Crime, and many more. Thanks for listening.