By Debby Woodin

dwoodin@joplinglobe.com

Neighborhood opposition once again shot down a permit request to operate a bed and breakfast at the site of the 1933 Bonnie and Clyde shootout.

While business people spoke in favor of the Rev. Phillip McClendon’s effort to turn the garage apartment at 3347 1/2 Oak Ridge Drive into a pay-for-stay accommodation, most of those who live in the area testified against a permit.

McClendon had sought a special-use permit from the city, required to operate a bed and breakfast at the two-bedroom apartment where the infamous Barrow gang holed up for 12 days before shooting its way out and killing two lawmen in the fray.

McClendon said he has stocked the apartment with books, copies of a BBC documentary shown on the History Channel, movies and law enforcement reports regarding the notorious guests and their departing shootout.

Designations

The apartment has recently been designated a state and national historic site and placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

McClendon’s supporters on the effort included Allen Shirley, a Joplin man who is vice chairman of the Missouri Advisory Council on Historic Preservation; Doris Carlin a Joplin real estate agent who assisted the city in adopting historic preservation ordinances and establishing a local commission; and others, including a next-door neighbor.

Shirley told the council that state and federal authorities spent about two years verifying and researching before granting historic status to the property. “It would seem to me rather wasteful to now let it sit and be underutilized.”

He said there already is a bed and breakfast in the neighborhood, four blocks from the McClendon property. He said it is the same type of construction with the same parking, but did not generate opposition from the neighborhood.

Scott Hutson, an owner of Cycle Connection Harley-Davidson Buell, located south of the neighborhood, said Joplin is known worldwide as a historic Bonnie and Clyde site. He often is asked about the site or for directions to it by customers visiting his shop.

“It’s just as important (to Joplin) as Route 66,” he said. “It’s a story that’s traveled worldwide. Our city will always be linked, whether we try to ignore it or not, to Bonnie and Clyde.”

Carlin said that sustainable tourism helps to underpin local economies and that people are drawn to the places where they can tell nostalgic stories. “It’s all about our stories. Bonnie and Clyde is a story that brings people to our city.”

Carter Lee, who lives next door to the site, spoke in favor of the permit, saying he does not condone the violence Bonnie and Clyde’s story represents. “But it is history. There is historic significance, and that’s what should be respected.”