Tom Goodman, a local author, spoke to us about his book “The Last Man,” which tells the story of the “Santa Claus” bank robbery in Cisco, Texas two days before Christmas 1927. There were four men involved in the robbery and only one of them lived to an old age. Tom gave us some details about the heist and how it went wrong. It was meant to be an easy heist in 3 minutes, but the bank ended up being surrounded and anyone who came out was shot at because there was a $5,000 bounty ($85,000 in today’s money) for killing bank robbers. The robbers took hostages as shields to get away, including two 4th graders. During the escape, two law enforcement officers died. The search for the four men was the biggest man hunt at the time, and they used aerial reconnaissance for the first time. One of the robbers died during the getaway. The other three were put on trial - two were sentenced to death and one was given life instead. Of the two sentenced to death, one was lynched after trying to escape and the other put to death in the electric chair. The story usually ends there, but Tom’s book tells the story of what happened to the fourth man, the one who lived to old age. He kept trying to break out of the prison farm and getting caught but later became a model citizen and was pardoned and released. Tom read us an excerpt from the book that describes the four robbers but did not let on which one was the one who lived. You’ll have to read the book to find out!