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Police Station Scene
Tribune photo published August 3, 1950

Eugene Clifford Langbeen, of Hammond, Ind., presented this picture at the Ames police station yesterday afternoon after he was nabbed in the biggest manhunt in Story county in recent history.  Shown, left to right, Sheriff Ivan Shalley, who aided in directing the search for the youth who stole a car and led the pursuing officers on a 90-mile-an-hour chase, an unidentified member of the posse, Langbeen and Ames policeman Arlie Schumer.  Standing next to Schumer and to Schumer’s left in the background is Ames fireman Max Tevebaugh, who, along with Pete Morris, captured Langbeen.

Officers said he told his tale of his Ames escapades calmly and appeared indifferent to his plight.  Langbeen admitted, officers said, that he stole the car belonging to Henry Arends at gun point Tuesday night, led officers on a 27-mile chase and that he stole the pistol he was carrying at the time he was picked up by Deputies Pete Morris and Max Tevebaugh.

He would not admit, officers said, that he wounded Ames policeman Jay Ferguson, who was hit by a bullet during the chase and who is in Mary Greeley hospital recovering from a wound in his right arm.  Ballistics on the gun carried by Langbeen are being conducted by the state crime detection laboratory in Des Moines today.

Although armed with a .38 caliber revolver and 43 shells, Langbeen surrendered meekly to the two deputies who found him walking along a Story county road 5 3/4 miles southwest of Ames yesterday afternoon.  His capture followed an intensive manhunt, aided by an airplane, that began Tuesday night when he abandoned a stolen car in which he had led officers in a 95-mile-an-hour chase from Ames nearly to Boone and back.  During the chase Patrolman Jay Ferguson was shot in the arm when he pulled his patrol car alongside the fleeing auto.  The wound was not serious.

Langbeen told authorities he hid in farm fields after abandoning the car when he drove into a dead end street here.  They said he told them he stole the revolver and ammunition found with him from an automobile in Cedar Rapids, and admitted taking a car and $10 from Arends at gunpoint after hiding in the rear seat.

Agent T.A. Thompson of the State Bureau of Criminal Investigation said Langbeen was employed last week as a shipping foreman for the Pennsylvania railroad at Indian Harbor, Ind.  He said Langbeen told officers he hitch-hiked to Marshalltown via Cedar Rapids, then rode a freight train to Ames.  Thompson said the youth's draft card gave his age as 19, although a driver's license indicated he was 21.

Resting comfortably in Mary Greeley hospital today was Policeman Jay Ferguson, only one to be injured Tuesday night in the shooting and chasing which followed Langbeen's theft of a car belonging to Henry Arends.  Ferguson was wounded in the right arm by a revolver bullet early in the chase, but continued to pursue the bandit's car to Boone and back.  The young Ames policeman found time in the hospital to study his fingerprint textbook.  - more about Ames Police  - (includes a 1957 photo of Jay Ferguson

Eugene Clifford Langbeen, of Indiana, who caused lots of excitement in a wild shooting escapade here Tuesday night after stealing an automobile, was taken to the Story county jail at Nevada today.  He was arraigned in municipal court before Judge Harold Nichols yesterday and waived to the grand jury on two counts.

The stocky, red-haired youth was formally charged with robbery with aggravation and with larceny of a motor vehicle.  Bond was set at $3,000 on the first charge and $2,000 on the second.  Ames police took the youth to the county jail.

Policeman Jay Ferguson, wounded in the wild chase which followed Langbeen's theft of a car belonging to Henry Arends of Ames, was released from the hospital yesterday.  The young Ames policeman was shot in the right arm during the chase.  His arm was painful during the night and he was still under a physician's care, but able to go to the doctor's office this morning to have the wound dressed.

Langbeen was captured Wednesday afternoon following a long shot-punctuated search by a posse of nearly 100 law enforcement authorities and Ames residents.  He was arrested by Story County Deputy Sheriff C.W. Morris and Ames fireman Max Tevebaugh.  Although he was armed with a .38 caliber revolver, he offered no resistance.  The pursuit started after Mr. and Mrs. Henry Arends of Ames were robbed of about $10 in cash by a bandit who hid in the back seat of their car, and then took the vehicle from them at gunpoint.

Langbeen told police he had taken the gun he used, and a box of ammunition, from a suitcase he had stolen from a parked car in Cedar Rapids earlier.