There's more to the Brinks gang story

I read with interest your Dec. 22 story about the Coudersport connection with the "crime of the century," the Brinks robbery of Jan. 17, 1950.

There was one factual error in your otherwise excellent article. You wrote that Specs O'Keefe and Gus Gusciora had embarked from Boston to the Midwest and had pulled off robberies in Kane and Coudersport on their westward trip.

Those heists actually took place on their return trip eastward, which explains why they first stole the guns in Kane and later broke into Rosenbloom's Men's and Boys' Store in Coudersport.

On their wild trip of roughly 1,200 miles, they were basically looking for "clean" guns they could steal so the serial numbers couldn't be tracked back to their criminal haunts in Boston. They also had a flair for dressing stylishly, which was not uncommon among gangsters from that era.

O'Keefe and Gusciora probably would have gotten away with the Pennsylvania thefts - and perhaps the Brinks robbery would not have been solved - except for the fact that the labels from the Coudersport store were clearly visible on the stolen clothing found in the O'Keefe and Gusciora car in Bradford County (tailed from Towanda, as you reported, but actually pulled over in Ulster).

There is a great account of the reasons O'Keefe spilled the beans about the Brinks robbery in a 1977 book by the late Noel Behn, entitled, Big Stick-Up at Brinks. It is more factual than the 1961 book by Bob Considine (as told by Specs O'Keefe), The Men Who Robbed Brinks. The latter book plays up O'Keefe's role and propagandizes on behalf of J. Edgar Hoover's FBI.

I have studied the life of Specs O'Keefe and the other Brinks gang members in some detail. Like any of the other Brinks robbers, he wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed, but he strikes me as almost a sympathetic character later in life.

For many years, Specs was a small-time thief in Boston, especially skilled at lockpicking and break-ins. His nickname came not from the fact that he wore glasses, but because as a child he had prominent freckles.

O'Keefe was perhaps the least popular of the 11 members of the Brinks gang and, yes, it's true that he did not always live by a very strong moral code.

Specs had all kinds of incentives to rat out the gang, but he kept his mouth shut until their betrayal of him rose to the level of attempted murder. Finally, through the skillful work of an FBI Special Agent, O'Keefe broke down and told investigators everything.

Sadly, the promises of support by the FBI proved to be empty, and O'Keefe lived in fear for his life. He held various odd jobs and spent the final 16 years of his life basically in exile, afraid to go back to Boston and reunite with what little family he had left.

My research also suggests that the other Coudersport/ Kane burglar, Gus Gusciora, was horribly mistreated at Western Penitentiary in Pittsburgh. He died at a young age of mysterious causes, apparently taking the secrets of the Brinks robbery to his grave. I'm quite certain that O'Keefe never would have talked if his good friend Gusciora had survived his stay at Western.

So, where is all the money from the Brinks robbery, you ask?

There was so much deceit and sloppy behavior by the robbers that the millions of dollars probably just melted into the underground economy. There may be small stashes of it hidden here or there, but based on published reports and the character of these men, it is my opinion that it most of it is long gone.