SANTA CLAUS BANK ROBBERY, Dec 23, 1927
"At the time it occurred, the Santa Claus Bank Robbery was one of Texas' most infamous crimes and led to the largest manhunt ever seen in the state. It all began on December 23, 1927, around noon when Marshall Ratliff, Henry Helms, Robert Hill, all ex-cons, and Louis Davis, a relative of Helms, held up the First National Bank in Cisco. Ratliff had been caught with his brother Lee after robbing a bank in Valera, and they had each served only a year of their sentences before being pardoned by Governor Miriam A. Ferguson. They had planned to rob the Cisco bank together, but Lee had already been arrested again. So Marshall pulled in Helms and Hill, whom he knew from Huntsville, and a fourth man who was good with safes. As they planned the crime in Wichita Falls, the safe-cracker came down with the flu, and the trio pulled in Davis, a family man in need, with the offer of big money. The four stole a car in Wichita Falls and headed for Cisco. They arrived on the morning of December 23 and prepared to make themselves some easy money, or so they thought.
During this period three or four Texas banks a day were being robbed, and in response, the Texas Bankers Association had offered a $5,000 reward to anyone shooting a bank robber during the crime. It was partly this reward that turned a simple bank robbery into a deadly crime. As the group neared the bank, Ratliff donned a Santa Claus suit he had borrowed from Mrs. Midge Tellet, who ran the boarding house where they had been staying in Wichita Falls. They let Ratliff out several blocks from the bank. Followed by children attracted to "Santa," Ratliff joined the other three in an alley and led the way into the bank. He did not respond to the greetings directed at Santa, and the other three drew their guns, indicating that it was a holdup. While the others covered the customers and employees, Ratliff grabbed money from the tellers and forced one to open the vault. Mrs. B. P. Blassengame and her daughter entered the bank while the holdup was in progress. Mrs. Blassengame, realizing the danger, led her daughter out another door, despite warnings from the robbers that they would shoot. She went into the alley and screamed for help, alerting Chief of Police G. E. (Bit) Bedford and most of the citizenry about the robbery. Several minutes later, Ratliff had filled his sack with money and came out of the vault. Seeing someone outside, Hill fired a shot through the window, and a shot was returned. Hill fired several more shots into the ceiling to show that they were armed. A fusillade of gunfire began, as many citizens who owned guns were now outside the bank. The robbers forced all of the people in the bank out the door and towards their car. Several of these hostages were wounded as they emerged into the alley, including Alex Spears, the bank president. Most of the customers escaped; however, two small girls, Laverne Comer and Emma May Robertson, were taken as hostages. In a shootout in the alley, as the robbers tried to get to their car, Chief Bedford and Deputy George Carmichael were mortally wounded; Bedford died several hours later, and Carmichael held on until January 17. Ratliff and Davis were also wounded in the shootout, Davis severely.......
........The First National Bank still stands in Cisco, although it is in a new building. It features a painting of the robbery, as well as a collection of newspaper clippings and pictures of those involved. In 1967 the Texas State Historical Survey Committee (now the Texas Historical Commissionqv) placed a medallion on the bank commemorating the robbery."