{gallery}03_26_09/durand{/gallery} Ron Blevins of Powell scrutinizes a rifle at the Homesteader Museum's Durand exhibit Tuesday. The rifle is said to have been used by Earl Durand 70 years ago to shoot two men and knock off the First National Bank in Powell. Although Blevins was only 2 at the time, he remembers Durand through his father, George Blevins. The elder Blevins reported the bank heist live on the radio. Tribune photo by Gib MathersPop culture may have painted desperado Earl Durand, who killed four men, a misunderstood James-Dean type with a gun, or 1930s newspapers and pulp magazine as a crazed killer, but Durand's true story is steeped in tragedy.The Powell Centennial Committee provided a display, lecture and film spotlighting Durand Tuesday with the unveiling of a Durand display at the Homesteader Museum.

Seventy years ago Tuesday, Durand, 26, of Powell, ended his killing rampage by taking his own life, following his foiled attempt to flee after robbing the First National Bank in Powell.

Durand had been arrested for poaching elk. He busted out of jail, killed two policemen and later two members of a posse. A bank teller also was killed in a chaotic shooting spree outside the bank.

The Homesteader Museum exhibit displays guns, photos, artifacts and newspaper and magazine articles chronicling Durand's meteoric rise to infamy and his flame-out at his own hand.

In one display rests a Winchester Model 94 rifle that authenticates the story.

Carved in the rifle's stock, like notches on a gunfighter's pistol grip, are these words: “The gun that Earl Durand took from Vern Graham March 31, 1939 • Killed two posse men • Used in bank holdup.”

Other rifles are on display along with a homemade cartridge belt.

An authentic-appearing, wood-carved pistol resembling a Colt Peacemaker conveys a sense of deadly efficiency entombed in glass.

Thick bold headlines from a March 24 Wyoming State Tribune proclaim: “TRENCH MORTAR PRESSED INTO USE TO BOMBARD DURAND'S HIDING PLACE.”

That was when Durand was holed-up in the Clarks Fork Canyon area.

Shortly after, Durand slipped away and returned to Powell. Not long after, he was dead. The Denver Post shouts: “SPLATTERING BULLETS FELL THE NATIONS WORST OUTLAW.”

Years later, Durand remains the center of controversy.

Durand struck close to home for many residents, rendering objectivity difficult, said Rob Koelling, an English instructor at Northwest College and author of a history of the First National Bank.

Koelling conducted the bank history research, and Durand was a part of that history.

“This was something of a hot potato, even in 1997,” Koelling said.

Rowene Weems, Homesteader director/curator and Centennial Committee member, has been arranging Powell's history for the eyes and senses, including information about Durand.

Without casting judgment, Weems said Durand was a significant part of Powell's history.

“This has been a very delicate exhibit to imagine even putting together,” Weems said.

Later that evening, Centennial Committee member Jeremy Johnston presented the revival of the 1974 film, “The Legend of Earl Durand” — a cheesy flick that gives new meaning to the words, “artistic license.”

About the only factual element in the picture was Durand's death.

With an anti-establishment slant, the movie portrayed Durand as a victim of ruthless police persecution.

The narrator, reminiscent of the movie “Jeremiah Johnson” two years before, padded slower scenes with his melancholy rhetoric: “Rugged, yet gentle, Earl Durand.”

At the film's gloomy conclusion, the raspy-voiced barb asked, “What kind of brand would you put on the man, Earl Durand?”

Around the country, people were gobbling up sensationalized accounts of Durand. Locally, folks were reading their neighbors' obituaries, Johnston said.

Dead Marshal Charles Lewis, honored last week by Powell police, was a community leader. He was responsible for getting Powell's water and sewer systems on line. He was a family man, respected by his contemporaries and loved by kids, Johnston said.

Durand's other victims left behind wives, children and friends. Durand's parents also suffered.

“I can't imagine how gut-wrenching those few days were to the community,” Johnston said.