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Denver Police Department Mug Shot of Kurth Jack Kelm dated February 2, 1950, Denver, Colorado.

Career criminal Kurth Jack Kelm was born on November 21, 1906, to parents Herman and Victoria Kelm.  (Depending on when he was asked, “Where were you born?” Kelm would respond with “Germany” or “Milwaukee.”)    It appears the Kelm’s emigrated to the United States in 1909 and settled in Milwaukee, where Herman got work as a house painter.  Kurth had two younger brothers, Walter and Willie.  He claimed to have started his life of crime by stealing bicycles at age 15. 

Arrested in California at 18

Aside from a 1910 Census report and a Florida State Prison Register, tracking the arc of Kurth Jack Kelm’s life required reliance on the numerous newspaper articles reporting his crimes, arrests, prison sentences, and prison escapes. The earliest article appeared in the Spokane Chronicle, dated December 26, 1923, with its headline shouting “Boy of 18 Confesses Hundred Burglaries” in the Los Angeles and Bay areas.  According to the Chronicle, Kelm learned his nefarious craft in a “Fagin School” conducted by an old man in Seattle and had come to the L.A. and Bay areas from Chicago five months before.   (“Fagin” is the name of the Dickens character in “Oliver Twist” who teaches young homeless boys how to be pickpockets and then fences their stolen goods.) 

According to the Chronicle and other sources, Kelm had been operating with a fence named Newton Delffs, who ran the Kodak shop in Venice, California’s Dragon Bathhouse.  Kelm, eager to prove that the ultimate blame for wrongdoing rested rightly on the head of someone else, avowed it was Delffs who would urge him to commit further burglaries.    

According to a detective who was tracking Kelm, Kelm would wear a red sweater when on the street and stuff stolen items under it.  He would then return to his hotel room to stash the stolen goods, take off the sweater, and return to the street showing “an air of nonchalance.”  Stolen items found by police in Kelm’s hotel room included four Christmas packages, one black grip, one clock, one new shirt, one suitcase, two rings in boxes, two dresser scarves, two ladies’ collars, several handkerchiefs, one cameo stick pin, one ladies’ red sport sweater, a fur neck scarf and two expensive candlesticks with holders. 

A police search of Delffs’ home at 149 Raymond Avenue turned up a pair of glasses, three fountain pens, two Eversharp pencils, several toilet articles, two Christmas packages, one silver hand mirror, and a beaded bag.  Police visits to L.A. pawn shops frequented by both Kelm and Delffs turned up, among other things, a Howard watch, a Corona typewriter, one black handbag, one three-stone opal and diamond ring, two Kodak cameras, and an expensive pair of binoculars.   It was learned that Delff sold customers Kodak cameras at his Kodak shop in Venice which he had purchased from Kelm for a few bucks apiece.  As part of their investigation into Kelm, the police reported they were identifying and returning items from 35 to 40 homes in Santa Monica stolen by Kelm and likely fenced by Delffs.  

In March of 1924, bail for Kelm was set at $5,000, and he was sentenced by the Bay District Court to three years imprisonment at Ione, California for his crimes in the Bay area.  The reference to Ione meant Kelm was sent to the Preston School of Industry there.  The Preston School, a reform school founded in 1890, sat on 230 acres of land purchased from the Ione Coal and Iron Company and was established by the California state legislature to provide rehabilitation rather than imprisonment for juvenile offenders.  The fact that Kelm at age 18 was a teenager may have qualified him for this program. 

Arrested in Denver in 1925

Kelm was apparently paroled from the Preston School of Industry after serving there for only one year, for in June of 1925 he was arrested on grand larceny charges in Denver for stealing a car from H.A. Marr, a wholesale grocer.  For this, he was sentenced to three to five years at the Colorado State Penitentiary in Canon City beginning in July 1925. 

Escape from Canon City Penitentiary on May 23, 1930

On May 23, 1930, Kelm escaped from the Canon City pen.  He made his escape with fellow convict R. E. Spencer of Pueblo while they were working on the new cell house under guard J. P. Claussen.  It was not known how they made their escape. 

Caught in Oklahoma City on June 3, 1930

On the lam from Canon City for all of 10 days, Kelm was arrested in Oklahoma under the name Jack Long while attempting to break into a drugstore.  He told police he had robbed several homes in Oklahoma City and had stolen a car in Wichita, which he abandoned north of Oklahoma City.   His fingerprints told police he was Kurth Jack Kelm.  He was returned to Canon City.

Imprisoned in Florida in 1932 until His Escape in 1936

Paroled from the Colorado penitentiary sometime after 1930 and not one to fritter away his prison pallor in the great out-of-doors, Kelm was arrested in Citrus County, Florida, in 1932 for breaking and entering and began a five-year sentence in the Florida State Prison in November of that year. 

On August 19, 1936, Kelm was working with other Florida State inmates at a state road department camp at Kissimmee (known as a “chain gang” in the old days) when he and two other inmates escaped.   They had stolen a pistol from the guard’s quarters and fled from the camp to a nearby house.  When they knocked on the front door, Dr. L. C. Daughtry answered.  When confronted with the pistol and a demand for his car keys, he told them the keys were in the car.  As the convicts moved toward the car, one of them turned around and shot the doctor, who sustained a minor flesh wound in the thigh.  Years later, Kelm would claim he was the shooter that day.  I learned that Florida later decided not to extradite Kelm for the escape, as he was otherwise incarcerated at Canon City. 

The 7” Mutt and Jeff” Robberies in 1940

Sometime after being released from Canon City, Kelm made the acquaintance of a fellow in Denver named Arleigh McClure.  They teamed up in February of 1940 to rob the Safeway Drive-In (!) grocery store in Longmont, and by the time they were apprehended in May, they had robbed a total of seven grocery stores.  Except for the Longmont job, all were committed in Denver on alternating Saturday nights.  In a number of their robberies, each came in holding two revolvers. The seven robberies netted $7,000 for Kelm and McClure.

By the time they were caught, Kelm and McClure had been christened the “Mutt and Jeff” robbers after the Bud Fisher comic strip characters created in 1907.  The Bud Fisher “Mutt” character was a “tall, rangy racetrack character,” and “Jeff” was a “half-pint…inmate of an insane asylum.”  In the case of Kelm and McClure, Kelm was tall, and McClure was short, thus the “Mutt and Jeff” sobriquet. 

McClure worked in a Denver garage on Broadway where police brought patrol cars for tire and battery work, and he would eavesdrop on the officers’ conversations.  Following the onset of his and Kelm’s grocery store robbery spree, he overheard plans to station 81 police officers with sawed-off shotguns at certain Denver supermarkets on Saturday nights.  Knowing which stores would not be covered by the police, he and Kelm confined their activities to other stores. 

As a result of these robberies, Kelm was sentenced to 18 years at Canon City.  

1949 Robbery of Denver’s Beacon Supper Club

Kelm was paroled in April of 1949 after serving only half of his 18-year sentence for the “Mutt and Jeff” robberies.  Not wanting the tail end of 1949 to get by him without obtaining more east cash, on December 11th, wearing an improvised mask and gun in hand, he confronted co-owner Willie Hartzell at his Beacon Supper Club in Denver and came away with $1800.  (The Beacon Supper Club sat at 7800 East Colfax. A look at Google Maps reveals that the building is still there.)

February 2, 1950, Attempted Heist of Miller Supermarket in Denver

On February 2, 1950, not two months after his Beacon Supper Club robbery, Kelm hit his next target, the Miller Supermarket at 500 South Broadway in Denver.  Arriving there at 1:00 p.m., he pulled his gun on J. L. Dithermer, who was sitting in his car in the store’s parking lot.  Ordering Dithermer to start his engine, he told Dithermer he was about to rob the store and then forced him to enter the store ahead of him.  Once in the store, he walked directly up to assistant store manager Martin Breheny, who was supervising the check cashing stand.  Not showing his gun, he leaned over the counter and said to Breheny, “This is it.  Get the money out of the safe—all of it.”  Thinking Kelm was joking, Breheny laughed, and at that point, Kelm lined his gun up on Breheny’s stomach and mildly said, “I wouldn’t laugh if I was you.”  Breheny then emptied the safe, Kelm took the money, jumped into Dithermer’s car, and roared off.  Meanwhile, Breheny went to the back of the store to let other employees know there was a robbery, at which point one of them called the police.

Captain Ed Madden and Roy Floyd in cruiser #30 picked up Kelm’s trail at West First Avenue and Acoma Street and pursued him over dirt roads at speeds up to seventy miles per hour.  Forced to stop because of the blinding dust, officers in a total of 17 cars sped up and down streets looking for Dithermer’s car.  It was found abandoned in an alley in the 2100 block of South Delaware.  Kelm was next spotted walking along the railroad tracks in the 1600 block of Santa Fe Drive.   Officers Hammons and Hinkle left their cruiser and closed in on foot.  When they were about 25 feet away, Kelm saw them and ran.  Hammons fired two warning shots, but Kelm kept running and ducked into the Columbine Motel at 1680 South Santa Fe. Reinforcements arrived in the form of Detectives Fred Currier and George Myers, who flushed Kelm out of his hiding place between two buildings.  They advanced with guns drawn, and he surrendered meekly.  Found on Kelm’s person were $2800 of the stolen Miller loot, a .38 caliber automatic, and a box of shells. 

Back at the station, where he was booked and posed for the mug shot shown above, Kelm admitted to the Beacon Supper Club robbery on December 11th, the Labor Finance Industrial Bank robbery on November 19 ($600 take), and two robberies at the Safeway Supermarket at 26 West Ellsworth, the first on January 7th for about $300 and the second on January 24th for about $600.  Kelm said he wore a makeshift mask in those robberies.  (I was struck by how well-dressed Kelm appeared to be in his mug shot.)

Kelm told police he had been living at 311 Inca Street up to a week before, but got word on the grapevine that he was “hot,” so moved to an apartment at 1460 Pearl.  Following Kelm’s capture, police arrested a 16-year-old boy as a possible accomplice after he was spotted leaving Kelm’s Pearl Street apartment by Ray Fell, a retired city detective who lived in the same building.  The boy was carrying two suitcases containing Kelm’s clothing.  The boy said he had known Kelm for several months, and that Kelm had recently told him that if he were arrested, the boy was to pick up his clothing. 

For these robberies, Kelm was sentenced to 35 to 40 years at Canon City. 

Why Armed Robbery?

In February of 1950, following Kelm’s failed heist of the Miller Supermarket in Denver earlier in the week, Al Nakkula, a reporter for the Rocky Mountain News, was allowed to interview Kelm in his holding cell at the Denver County jail.  Nakkula asked him why he did stickups, and Kelm replied, “It’s simple.  When you’ve got that gun in your hand, it’s better than a certified check.  They’ll hand you a roll faster than you can wink.  And it’s fast, easy work—if you ain’t looking for trouble.  And I ain’t no trouble shooter.  I ain’t out to shed blood or hurt nobody.  When I smell trouble I use my feet and not my trigger finger.  In that job Tuesday, if that manager had given me a little more lip I would have wheeled and heeled without the dough. I just ain’t a guy for trouble.”  (These statements clearly conflict with his earlier statement that he shot Dr. L.C.. Daughtry in the thigh back in 1936.)  

Nakkula responded, “Well, how come you can’t stay out of trouble?” To which Kelm said, “You got me.  I don’t know why I go in for stickups. For years I sit in jail and wonder why and as soon as I’m out I scare up enough to get me a rod (gun). Then I’m back in trouble again.”

Kelm continued, “I go out and try jobs.  I get them, too.   But you can’t make dough fast waiting for the payroll to get out. I like money,  I’m a spender.  So I plan a heist.  It’s easy.  I don’t get excited.  I don’t get drinking or hopped up.  I work alone–except for the time I gets in with Jeff (of the “Mutt and Jeff” robberies). It’s easy come, easy go, as they say.”

At the time of the interview, Kelm’s biggest fear was that the system would pin “the bitch” on him, i.e., that he would be sentenced to life in prison for being an habitual criminal.  (Kelm’s luck held somehow, for he was never pinned with “the bitch.”)

From Robber to Santa

In 1952, prisoner Kelm learned of the Beacon Supper Club’s annual involvement in charitable toy drives for disabled children and proceeded to convene a posse of fellow convicts to make Christmas toys and gifts for the club’s drives, which they did for a number of years.  (If you’ll recall, he robbed the Beacon of $1800 in 1949.)  The goodies would include items that convicts would have otherwise made to sell at the prison’s store, including bracelets, miniature pocketbooks, wood carvings, and toys.   As a way of thanking Kelm and his fellow inmates, club owners Willie Hartsell and Jerry Bakke, who were a comedy team, and members of their staff, which included musical performers, paid a visit to Kelm and his fellow prisoners in the spring of 1954 and threw a party and show for them.  Kurth Jack Kelm was the master of ceremonies for the event.   In 1959, Kelm even received permission to attend, under guard, the Beacon Club’s annual get-together. 

Out and about in 1963 with “Mad Dog” Sherbondy

If you can believe it, by 1963 Kelm had been paroled from the 35-to-40-year sentence he received in 1950.  He then turned up in Illinois in October of that year with James R. “Mad Dog” Sherbondy and an accomplice named Arlen Thompson.  Sherbondy, who had been missing after a no-show with his parole officer in September, had received a life sentence at Canon City in November of 1937 for the Colorado murder when he was 17 of Deputy Sheriff O.W. Meyer of Eagle County, but his sentence was commuted by Governor McNichols in 1960 to 44 years and 10 months.  He was then paroled on December 12, 1962. 

Sherbondy was reportedly the ringleader of two of the Canon City Penitentiary’s most sensational prison breaks.  One of them occurred in 1947, when Sherbondy and eleven other convicts escaped from the Canon City cellblock known as “Little Siberia.”  The cops caught up with them, killing two and wounding four.  A fifth was wounded by a “hammer-swinging ranch wife” encountered during their free time.  This escape was dramatized in the movie, “Canon City,” which one can read about at https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040210/?ref_=tt_mv_close.   The poster for the movie exclaims, “Filmed with the Naked Fury of FACT!”  I doubt that filming can get much better than that.

When arrested in Illinois, Kelm was wearing an empty holster strapped to his belt and was in possession of an Illinois driver’s license, which Kelm said a woman had given him in a Chicago nightclub.    Sherbondy was carrying $1625 on him, and $1682 was found in a search of the car’s trunk.  A search of the car also revealed four homemade bombs, four revolvers and a shotgun.  The three were charged with the $7,000 armed robbery of a Piggly Wiggly supermarket in Crystal Lake, Illinois.  Kelm and Sherbondy were sentenced to 3 to 7 years in prison for the robbery.  Kelm was sent back to Canon City to serve that sentence and was eventually released in 1972.

A Move to Greeley, Colorado   

Newspaper articles in the Greeley Tribune indicate that Kelm moved to Greeley in the early 70’s. The articles portray a helpful, law-abiding citizen.  For example, in April of 1975, Kelm gave chase to a purse snatcher.  Ms. Hulda Nash was talking to a friend when a young man grabbed her purse and ran.  Jack Kelm witnessed the act and chased the youth to a garage behind Repp’s Electric in the 1500 block of 8th Avenue.  He saw the youth enter the garage and exit it without the purse.  Kelm found the purse in the garage.  It was determined that the thief had stolen $8 and several credit cards.   The Tribune reported in March of 1977 that Kelm, a member of the First United Methodist Church in Greeley, called the police to report a broken church window. 

I discovered from the Tribune that Kelm had been married, for the Tribune reported the dissolution of his marriage in District Court in Greeley in November of 1973.  It appears his wife had accommodated Kelm’s need for an alias, for the dissolution announcement read, “J. C. Stevens, also known as Jack Kelm, 1129 12th Street, and Mrs. Jan Stevens, also known as Jan Dunaway, of Denver.” 

Back to the Can

On March 28, 1989, a man and his 11-year-old son were walking in the vicinity of Longmont’s First Bank-South, when the boy noticed that an elderly man who had just exited the bank pulled a nylon stocking from off his face and climbed onto a ten-speed bicycle.  He told his dad what he had just seen, and the two pursued the man in their car and caught up with him.  After a confrontation and struggle, they held him for the police. Police arrested Kelm for the robbery of that bank with what turned out to be a starter pistol.  He had stolen the bicycle he used.   At the time of his arrest, he was 82.

It turns out he was also found to have committed restaurant and supermarket robberies in the previous two years in Fort Collins, Loveland, and Longmont, which had been attributed at the time to the “salt and pepper bandit,” an allusion to Kelm’s graying hair.  In each case, the suspect would steal a vehicle before the robbery. 

When all was said and done, Kelm, now 84 years old, was sentenced to six years in prison, fortunate once again for not being sentenced to life imprisonment as an habitual criminal.  He likely served his sentence at the Federal Correctional Institute in Englewood. 

Kind Acts

News of Kelm’s arrest and sentencing was accompanied by statements from former neighbors that Kelm was considered a model neighbor who worked odd jobs, volunteered for church work, shoveled sidewalks and performed yard work for others.  It was reported that he spent nearly every morning feeding bread to the ducks and geese at Glenmere Park.  The report from former neighbor Michelle Terrier was rich in irony.  She said, “…he has to be some kind of Robin Hood because he never seemed to have money of his own.”   When Kelm was arrested, he told police he had never committed a crime in Greeley and that he robbed banks and restaurants to supplement his Social Security checks.   

It’s here that the newspaper trail of Kurth Jack Kelm goes cold. 

Death

I was able to find Kelm’s Social Security death report:  He died on January 18, 2006, at age 99.    

Aliases used by Kelm included:  Jack Dawson, Kenneth Keln, Kurth Keln, Jack Long, Jack Schotte, and J.C. Stevens

REFERENCES:

  • “Florida, U.S., State Prison Register, 1875-1959 for Kurth Kelm” (www.ancestry.com)
  • “Twenty-Seventh Biennial Report of the Colorado Board of Corrections and Warden of the Colorado State Penitentiary, Canon City, Colorado, November 30, 1930, at 

https://spl.cde.state.co.us/artemis/inserials/in31001internet/in31001192930internet.pdf

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