In celebration of the 76th anniversary of John Dillinger's capture by Tucson law enforcement, Hotel Congress will once again host Dillinger Days this Saturday, January 23.
The event has been held at Hotel Congress, 311 E. Congress St., every year since its inception in 1994, and this year's festival boasts numerous family-friendly events to ensure an exciting day for all.
Things kick off at 9 a.m. with the Model A Car Club's display of vintage Dillinger-era vehicles and concludes with a viewing of the Michael Mann directed Dillinger biopic, "Public Enemies" starring Johnny Depp, at 5:30 p.m. at Fox Theater, 17 W. Congress St.
The festival will also host music, history lectures, an arts and crafts fair and other fun, interesting events all in the spirit of the 1930s. The Cup's menu will even offer food that was on the menu during the time of Dillinger's arrest in 1934, such as Chicken Fricassee, said the hotel's Entertainment and Booking Director David Slutes.
Hotel Congress has also taken steps to making Dillinger Days a more family friendly event by creating activities aimed at children.
"We realized we didn't have enough to keep kids happy, so this we year we brought in the vintage carnival," Slutes said.
The most popular and unique event held at the festival is certainly the re-enactments of the Dillinger gang in Tucson and their local arrest. The scenes will be shown in two parts - both 30 minutes long - and will be shown twice throughout the day, once acted separately and once acted concurrently. The first scene will show at 11 a.m. with the following scene at 1 p.m., and the whole re-enactment will replay together at 3 p.m.
The re-enactment scenes are once again being put together by John Mincks and his acting troupe, who has performed the reenactments since the festival was first held 16 years ago.
"He knows the story very well and improves the scene every year," said Slutes.
Many in Tucson question the validity of a festival that, on first appearance, seems to celebrate a notorious thief and murderer. The event organizers swear it is in celebration of the Tucson Police Department's ability to capture the elusive criminal.
"We always have a police charity, it really is the focus," said Slutes, "the part of the Dillinger tale that Tucson law enforcement can really hang its hat on, they could take him down without a single gunshot fired, this is our thing to be proud of. He called Tucson a podunk down and it was some smart detective work that brought him down."
For the first time since they took over expenses for Dillinger Days in the early 2000s, the Downtown Tucson Partnership will not be financially supporting the event.
Slutes says the Partnership has been helpful but their budget problems have gotten too big.
"We have some sponsors helping but really, we've been eating it," said Slutes, "We have lost money but we believe in the event and see that it's a piece of Tucson that shouldn't be forgotten.
Visit HotelCongress.com for the schedule of activities.
