All Honest Men is based on the true-life story of J. Willis Newton, a feisty sharecropper's son who fled the Texas cotton fields to become the leader of the most successful band of outlaws in American history. It is also a window into one of the country's most pivotal eras, the early 20th Century--when the country was passing from a primarily rural society into an industrialized and urban one, and the American Dream was changing from owning a patch of land to making "big money." If there were an Olympic competition for bank and train robbing, Willis and his three brothers--Joe, Jess and Dock--would easily have won the gold medal, carrying off more money in their day than Jesse James, the Daltons, Butch Cassidy, and all the other famous outlaws put together.
