OUTSIDE LOOKING IN

I was visiting with some gentlemen at a senior living facility recently and the subject came up about the Willmar Bank Robbery of 1930 that I spoke about at the Kandiyohi County Historical Museum a few months back. I had tried for nearly 10 years to find out the names of the five bank robbers who stole $60,000 but were never caught. Mostly by coincidence, I came across a book written by J. Harvey Bailey for his family members only noted that he was the ringleader of the Willmar bank robbery and that one of the other men involved was "Machine Gun" Kelly.
As the gentlemen and I visited in a lounge area of the senior living facility, we started talking about famous robberies throughout history. One of the gentlemen listed the theft of the Mona Lisa painting from the Louvre in Paris. Although I love historical stories, I had never heard that the painting had been stolen. None of the men recalled any of the details to the theft, so I looked it up when I got home and was intrigued by the events of Aug. 20, 1911.
My two daughters were both fortunate enough to travel to Paris on school trips and visited the Louvre where they were able to view the Mona Lisa.
Some of you who are history buffs likely know about what was considered the "art heist of the century", but for others I felt it was compelling enough to relay the information.
The story goes: On a Sunday evening, a man who once worked at the Louvre as a handyman, strolled into the museum. With security lacking at that time, the man hid in a storage closet that he knew about near the Mona Lisa and other valuable paintings.
He remained in the closet until 7:15 the next morning when he appeared wearing a white apron that other museum employees wore. With no one else around, the man walked up the Mona Lisa and easily removed it from the wall. He then went to a nearby stairwell and removed the wooden canvas from its protective glass frame. As he attempted to exit the stairwell door to go into a courtyard, the door was locked.
His attempts to remove the doorknob were futile and he was soon noticed by one of the Louvre' plumbers. Figuring the man was an employee, the plumber unlocked the door for him and out he went with one of the world's most valuable paintings under his apron.
Because the museum's paintings were often removed from the wall to be cleaned or photographed, none of the Louvre's staff member had any idea the painting was stolen.
After two days, a visiting artist requested to view the painting. When no one could locate it in the museum, a frantic search began and authorities were called in. A few minutes later, the glass frame was discovered in the stairwell where the man left it behind and it was soon realized that the painting was stolen.
Numerous detectives were called into dust for fingerprints and question witnesses. Wanted posters were placed everywhere.
A man who once had expressed a desire to see the Louvre burn to the ground, Guillaume Apollinaire, was questioned. Apollinaire had been arrested in 1911 in connection with having his secretary steal two ancient statuettes from the Louvre. During his interrogation for that crime, Apollinaire implicated his close friend, Pablo Picasso, a 29-year-old Spanish artist who had purchased the statuettes from Apollinaire to use as models in his paintings.
Authorities questioned Apollinaire and Picasso in connection with the Mona Lisa disappearance, but both were cleared due to lack of evidence.
Many people believed that DaVinci's 400-year-old masterpiece would never be found.
It later turned out that the painting never left France and it had been in a one-room apartment on the outskirts of Paris, The thief was Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian immigrant who had helped construct Mona Lisa's protective frame when he worked at the Louvre.
Waiting for the search for the Mona Lisa to cool off somewhat, Peruggia hid the painting in a wood trunk with a false bottom in his apartment for two years before he decided to try and sell it.
In December of 1913, using a fake name, Peruggia sent a letter to an Italian art dealer, informing him that he had stolen the Mona Lisa and wanted to return it to Italy. The art dealer, Alfredo Geri, invited Peruggia to Florence, Italy, to get a look at the painting.
Upon viewing the painting, Geri agreed to Peruggia's asking price of 500,000 lire ($553,600 in U.S. dollars) upon having it authenticated. Instead, though, Geri reported Peruggia to the authorities and he was eventually arrested at his Florence hotel.
The Mona Lisa was returned to the Louvre in January, 1914. Peruggia was charged with theft and sentenced to one year and 15 days in prison. He served just seven months before gaining release following an appeal.
The heist made the Mona Lisa even more famous as 120,000 individuals viewed the painting in the first two days it was returned to the Louvre.
Today, the most recognizable painting remains in the Louvre. It hangs in a climate-controlled box protected by bulletproof glass. Over eight million visitors a year view the painting.