Kern Valley Bank Robbery

On the evening of February 18, 1876, the Kern Valley Bank in Bakersfield was robbed of over $27,000 (approximately $600,000 in 2014 money). According to his accounts, S. J. Lansing, the bank’s secretary and cashier, had just finished a meeting with Mr. C. Brower and was preparing to go to bed in his quarters at the rear of the bank when there was a knock at the back door. Thinking Mr. Brower had forgotten something, Lansing opened the door, and two men entered. On hit Lansing on the forehead, over the left eye, and knocked him unconscious. Lansing lay unconscious on the floor while the men broke into the safe and stole about $27,206.95 in coin and gold notes. They left the silver coin untouched. At about 3am the next morning, Lansing awoke and managed to crawl to his bed. At 6am, Mr. H. C. Parke, the Wells, Fargo & Co agent who had an office at the bank, found Lansing shivering in bed.

Four detectives from San Francisco were immediately brought in. The detectives interviewed the bank trustees and those residing near the bank. They also examined the office of Br. Brower and the houses of H. A. Jastro (a friend of Lansing’s), Judge Colby (who lived next door to the bank), and Solomon Jewett (president of the bank). No clues were gathered from the interviews or searches. On the following weekend, two men left town for San Luis Obispo and, after a warrant was issued for their arrest, were brought back to Bakersfield for questioning. They were released when nothing could be found tying them to the robbery.

A week after the robbery, the detectives were about to give up and return to San Francisco but decided to talk to Lansing again. Along with a friend of Lansing’s, the detectives interviewed Lansing in his quarters at the rear of the bank, and Lansing cracked under the pressure. He admitted to stealing the money and hitting himself in the head. Lansing had hidden the coin in the wall of his room. He instructed the detectives to peel back a piece of wallpaper above his bureau and reach into a hole in the wall to find a nail with a piece of string attached. At the end of the string were four bags containing the coin. He then instructed them where to find the notes hidden in an old trunk in the shed outside.

Lansing was promptly arrested, but was later released when several of his friends - many of whom were associated with the bank - provided the $5,000 bail. When his case came up for trial in May, Lansing was no where to be found. Several of his bondsmen went to San Francisco to try to locate him and learned that he had left the state. It wasn’t until February 1878 that Bakersfield again heard word of Lansing but, by that time, Lansing was dead. In the fall of 1876, Lansing fled to Shanghai, China where he changed his name and died on February 9, 1877.