LAGUNA BEACH

ORIGINAL COLOR LITHOGRAPH POSTER FOR EVANS AND SONTAG MELODRAMA, DONATED TO THE TULARE COUNTY MUSEUM BY PLAYWRIGHT'S GREAT GRANDSON. When Evelyn Kinkela died while a resident of the Laguna Beach Rest Home in 1970, having lived in Laguna Beach for 40 years, neighbors had no idea that this little old lady once ran messages for fugitive bank robbers and starred in a stage dramatization of her own life. In fact, her obituary in the Laguna News-Post made no mention of any of her past pursuits - nor of her maiden name, Eva Evans.

Born on May 13, 1876, barely weighing two pounds, Eva was the eldest of the seven children of Molly and Chris Evans, a notorious outlaw. The criminal escapades of Chris Evans and his partner John Sontag are recorded in history books, a "classic tale of the Old West," based on the well-known animosity between farmers and railroad barons that led to train robberies, gun battles and manhunts.

But the story about Eva Evans, who was daddy's little girl to one and fiancée to the other, has not been told until now, with the publication of "Train Robber's Daughter: The Melodramatic Life of Eva Evans, 1876 to 1970" (Raven River Press, 2008), written by Jay O'Connell

EVA EVANS, THE BUDDING YOUNG ACTRESS, IN SAN FRANCISCO IN 1893. Through extensive research, including an oral interview that solved a mystery, O'Connell has captured the extraordinary life of Eva Evans, one that started out like a real life John Ford western in Tulare County, shoot outs and all, and ended peacefully here in Laguna Beach.

After an itinerant existence based on where employment was available, by 1885 Evans settled his family in Visalia and planted a bean crop, considered a good cash crop in the San Joaquin Valley at the time. But he lost money on it because of the exorbitant railroad shipping rates. In 1897 he met John Sontag, a disgruntled former railroad employee, and offered him a place to live in exchange for helping out at the farm while he was on jobs. A bond was formed.

O'Connell describes the story of Evans and Sontag as two men, hard on their luck, and each having a bone to pick with the railroad. Add Eva, devoted to her father, and by the age of 14 generally expected to marry Sontag when she turned 17.

AFTER PAROLE FROM FOLSOM PRISON, CALIFORNIA OUTLAW CHRIS EVANS VISITED WITH HIS DAUGHTER EVA AT HER LOS ANGELES HOME WHERE SHE TOOK THIS PHOTO. Between 1889 and 1892, Evans and Sontag are believed to have robbed at least four trains. Though there was never enough evidence to convict them of the robberies, the murders committed during shootouts were different. Eva had such fierce loyalty to her father, that despite mounds of circumstantial evidence to the contrary, she insisted nearly to the end that the accusations against him as a train robber were false.

It was not until the third robbery that authorities began to suspect Evans and Sontag, and by the fourth, they took action. After the Collis train robbery on Aug. 3, 1892, the lawmen showed up at the family home for a showdown. Eva answered the door. Evans and Sontag eventually escaped, but two men died in their wake.

For the next 10 months Evans and Sontag were fugitives with a $10,000 reward for their capture. The press was all over it and one reporter, through Eva, even met with them.

"THE LITTLE HIGH HOUSE IN THE HILLS" RESIDENCE OF MRS. EVA EVANS MCCULLOUGH, LAGUNA BEACH, MAY 1936. Eva claimed to have brought the fugitives messages, taking midnight rides in boys clothing, a role she reprised on stage.

The outlaws escaped a shootout and an ambush, but were finally caught and wounded in a shootout at Stone Corral on June 11, 1893. Sontag died in prison, but Evans remained in jail, awaiting trial.

It was at this time that R. C. White immortalized the story on stage, with Eva and her mother playing themselves - first in San Francisco and then on the road. O'Connell suggests that they needed the money for lawyers' fees, but also that Eva enjoyed the excitement.

Eva took time off from the play to testify in her father's trial. When Evans was convicted of murder, Eva enlisted a friend to orchestrate a successful jailbreak. But after two months as a fugitive, her father was captured and imprisoned again. Eva continued her role in the play - getting increasingly negative press - until July 1894.

PORTRAIT OF EVA EVANS CIRCA 1900. At the age of 18, Eva puts behind her a life of shootouts, delivering messages to fugitives, and acting in the "blood-and-thunder" dramatization of her own story. Most of her exploits - and some imagined ones - made newspaper headlines. At under five feet, with flaxen hair and blue eyes, Eva was quite attractive. Newspaper accounts at the time attributed her at least two husbands, and other paramours. O'Connell helps the reader to separate fact from fiction.

Following bouts of depression and a questionable run-in with morphine, Eva's doctor suggested a change and she moved Oregon in 1898, where she took up photography and had a short-lived marriage to a man named Albert Cribb.

In 1909, Eva married Perry McCullough, a marriage that would stick. They moved to Los Angeles, poor but happy. Eva took an interest in social reform and the couple rubbed elbows with Emma Goldman's anarchist crowd.

They moved to Laguna Beach in 1930 and McCullough set up a real estate and insurance business on South Coast Boulevard. Eva's sister Ynez joined them, moving into a house on Catalina Street, followed by their mother and youngest brother, who worked as a shipping clerk at a pottery store.

EVELYN (EVA EVANS) MCCULLOUGH (LEFT) AND HER SISTER YNEZ (EVANS) JENSEN (RIGHT) WITH AN UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN (CENTER) ON A CAR TRIP. Eva, known as Evelyn McCullough and her husband moved to 480 Third Street in 1938. He wrote a column for the local paper called "Through the Years" and was an active supporter of the library. Meanwhile, Eva wrote her memoir, wanting, explains O'Connell, to set the story straight for the record, and still insisting on her father's innocence as a train robber. She tried, but ultimately failed to get it published and eventually donated it to the Huntington Library.

Eva's husband died in 1942, but was not to be her last. Eva's sister Ynez took on a boarder in the early 1960s, retired gardener Andrew Kinkela. Eva and Kinkela spent time together and in 1964 they were married. Eva was 88. In the years before her death in 1970, Eva got to know her stepdaughter, Lillian Kinkela Keil.

EVELYN (EVA EVANS) MCCULLOUGH AND YNEZ (EVANS) JENSEN IN LAGUNA BEACH IN THE EARLY 1960S. O'Connell, in the course of his research for the book, had the good fortune to speak on the phone with Lillian Keil about some papers she had of Eva's. When he brought up the fact that Eva never admitted that her father committed the train robberies, Keil set him straight, saying, "She admitted it. She told me her father had robbed trains. That was how they got their money." Jay O'Connell will be discussing his book at 7:30 p.m. on June 2 at an event sponsored by the Laguna Beach Historical Society at City Hall.

THE NEW BIOGRAPHY OF EVA EVANS FROM RAVEN RIVER