Before social media and splashy headlines, the camera in a police station told the story. Early-1900s mugshots weren’t just records; they were time capsules: stern faces, formal collars, and the quiet drama of a life paused between two flashes.
This roundup revisits 20 historical mugshots from the early 1900s that feel both distant and eerily familiar. You’ll see notorious names and forgotten ones, revolutionaries and rogues, and swindlers that prove that even a century ago, the lens could catch a whole era in a single frame.
1. Emma Goldman
Anarchist, speaker, and feminist firebrand, Goldman spent the 1910s railing against conscription and wartime crackdowns. She was arrested and convicted under the Espionage Act for organizing the No Conscription League and impeding the draft, following earlier arrests tied to incitement and labor agitation.
2. Joseph Stalin
Before he ruled the USSR, Stalin was a Bolshevik agitator repeatedly arrested by the Tsarist secret police. His early mugshots come from Okhrana files; historians note he was arrested multiple times between 1902 and 1913 for revolutionary activity and exiled to Siberia.
3. Eugene V. Debs
America’s most famous socialist and a five-time presidential candidate, Debs gave a 1918 antiwar speech in Canton, Ohio. He was arrested and sentenced to 10 years under the Espionage/Sedition Acts, a conviction later upheld by the Supreme Court in Debs v. United States in 1919.
4. Violette Nozière
In 1933, the Paris teen poisoned her parents, a sensational parricide case that gripped interwar France; her father died and her mother survived. Convicted the following year, her death sentence was later commuted amid public debate and shifting sympathies.
5. Fritz Haarmann
The “Butcher of Hanover”, Haarmann preyed on young men in Germany after World War I. Arrested in 1924, he was convicted of multiple murders and executed by guillotine in 1925.
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6. Eugenia Falleni (aka Harry Crawford)
Italian-born and New Zealand-raised, Falleni lived as a man in Sydney under the name Harry Leo Crawford, a fact that made his case a tabloid sensation. He was arrested in July 1920 for the 1917 death of his wife Annie Birkett near Lane Cove, convicted murder, and had his death sentence commuted to life imprisonment.
7. Clyde Barrow
One half of “Bonnie and Clyde”, Barrow cycled through arrests before escalating to a multi-state robbert spree. Early mugshots come from Dallas police files; he was ultimately killed by law officers in 1934.
8. George “Machine Gun” Kelly
Prohibition-era gangster whose notoriety peaked with the kidnapping of oilman Charles F. Urschel in 1933. Arrested that year, Kelly’s case helped cement the public image of Hoover’s “G-men”.
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9. Frank Costello
The “Prime Minister of the Underworld” became a household name during the Kefauver hearings. He ended up convicted of contempt of Congress and later tax evasion, serving time on both before appeals reshaped the outcomes.
10. George “Bugs” Moran
The North Side Gang boss and Capone’s bitter rival narrowly missed the 1929 St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. Later, he was arrested and imprisoned for robbery and related offenses, dying in federal custody in 1957.
11. Al Capone
Chicago’s most notorious bootlegger finally fell not for violence but for income-tax evasion. Convicted in 1931, he received an 11-year federal sentence, an outcome now inseparable from his famous booking photos.
12. “Squizzy” Taylor
Joseph Leslie “Squizzy” Taylor was Melbourne’s most famous 1920s gangster, in and out of court over robberies, gang wars, and escapes. His mugshots survive in Victoria’s prison records; he died in a 1927 shoot-out.
13. Dorothy Mort
A Sydney society figure at the center of a Christmas-season scandal, Mort shot her physician-lover Dr. Claude Tozer in 1920. She was found not guilty by reason of insanity and incarcerated; her stark intake photo appears in Australian police archives and press retrospectives.
14. Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti
Italian immigrant anarchists whose 1920 robbery-murder case in Massachusetts became a global cause célèbre. Convicted and executed in 1927, their trial’s fairness has been debated for a century.
15. Mata Hari
The Dutch dancer and courtesan became a wartime legend when France accused her of espionage for Germany. Arrested in 1917, she was executed by firing squad that October, a case still debated by historians.
16. Charles Ponzi
The namesake of the Ponzi scheme promised wild returns on international reply coupons untill the bubble burst in 1920. Arrested for mail fraud, he became a byword for financial deceit.
17. John Dillinger
Bank robber and jailbreak artist who turned into the era’s ultimate outlaw celebrity. Repeated arrests and mugshots mark his short career before he was gunned down outside a Chicago theater in 1934.
18. Peter Kürten
The “Vampire of Düsseldorf”, Kürten’s 1929 attacks shocked Germany and reshaped early criminology debates. Apprehended in 1930, he was convicted and executed by guillotine the following year.
19. Henri Désiré Landru
France’s “Bluebeard of Gambais” lured women through lonely-hearts ads during WWI. Arrested in 1919, he was convicted on multiple counts and guillotined in 1922.
20. Alvin “Creepy” Karpis
The Barker-Karpis gang’s strategist and the last Public Enemy No. 1 to be captured. Arrested in New Orleans in 1936, he spent decades behind bars.
Explore more historical content:
If you enjoyed this dive into forensic history, keep the nostalgia rolling with these 24 Vintage Photos That Perfectly Capture the Prohibition Era, or these 19 of the Last Known Photos of Famous Historical Figures. You may also like these 25 Iconic Moments in History Captured in Color.
