Climbing the Rock: A Visit to Alcatraz
By: Joe Volz Source: AARP.org Date Posted: 2003-10-02 00:00:00-04:00
Until recently, most Americans had no desire to go to Alcatraz, the notorious federal prison, known as the Rock, which is planted in the middle of San Francisco Bay.
It was a symbol of lost hope, where the toughest of prisoners were sent from 1934 to 1963—thugs like Al Capone, the notorious Chicago mobster, and "Machine Gun" Kelley, who definitely lived up to his name.
Now, Alcatraz is a big tourist attraction run by the National Park Service. Tourists are dying to get into the place. A million from all over the world visit the Rock each year.
The Famous Birdman
Perhaps, the man who popularized Alcatraz more than anyone else was the late inmate Robert Stroud, who spent a lifetime there. He was portrayed by Burt Lancaster as a kindly elderly prisoner in the movie, "Birdman of Alcatraz." But Stroud was not exactly a model of decorum. He committed manslaughter back in 1909 and later killed a prison guard at Leavenworth.
Stroud spent 17 years in Alcatraz, much of it solitary because of his vicious behavior.
He wrote two books about canaries and their diseases. Prison guards allowed Stroud to study birds until they discovered his "scientific" equipment had been used to construct a still for making home brew.
The prison celebrates its 70th anniversary in 2004. All of those tourists mark quite a change from the old days when inmates were literary dying to get out. There were 14 escape attempts. Twenty-three inmates were caught, six gunned down in the attempt and two drowned. Two of those who were caught were later executed at San Quentin for their part in killing a guard during an infamous 1946 cell block battle.
Did Anyone Succeed in Escaping?
The prevailing legend is that no one ever successfully escaped from Alcatraz. Currents swirling around the island were too treacherous for the handful who managed to escape to water's edge.
But, to this day, five prisoners are still listed as missing. Supposedly, they drowned but who can say for sure?
Visitors climbing the Rock these days can visit cell blocks portrayed in numerous gangster movies and even take a self-guided 35-minute recorded tour listening to inmates and guards describe life at Alcatraz.
Visiting an East Coast Pen
For East Coasters, the less prominent Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia is open to visitors, too. This is the prison, originally run by the Quakers, which was the first one named a penitentiary because the Quakers believed that by isolating the prisoners from any human contact, the inmates would be able to get in touch with their inner selves and repent.
A couple of miles from Independence Hall, Eastern State, which operated as a prison from the early 1800s until 1971, is an imposing granite medieval castle, surrounded by huge turrets and 30-foot-high walls. Capone spent some time in this place, too.
The early 19th century prisoners, mainly petty thieves, didn't realize they were involved in a noble Quaker experiment to turn them into penitents. Instead, many of them went insane.
There were 65,000 visitors last year. It's part of the city's appeal to younger visitors. The city publicists call the tourist campaign, "Hipstoric Philadelphia." The pitch, these days, in the City of Brotherly Love, is "We Love You Back."
There doesn't seem to be much love, though, emanating from the granite cells or along the long corridors. By the time Eastern closed, 1,100 inmates were crammed into 760 cells. There was no longer any time, or room, for quiet contemplation.
The hole was a real winner, for example. It is still there—a real hole about 10 feet deep and not more than six feet wide where prison rule-breakers spent weeks on a Spartan diet.
The city has a winner, though, in the dilapidated old prison. Paint may be flaking off the walls and rust stains are everywhere. But it is a center for art shows, concerts and the big event, a Halloween night, which nets several hundred thousand dollars each year.
Who says crime doesn't pay?
Former Inmates Talk on Tape
The stories of some of the recent inmates are morbidly fascinating.
Matthew Epps's tale is particularly pathetic. He had the rare pleasure of being on both sides of the fence at Eastern. Epps was a guard from 1956 to 1960. Then he became an inmate after killing his wife and her lover.
Kelley, who has met Epps twice says, "I never had the nerve to ask him too many details about his life back on the blocks."
Epps is a star on the audio tape provided visitors.
"I could never appreciate what the inmates went through when I was a guard," he notes, "but when I became an inmate, things changed. 'You can't do this. You can't do that.'"
Epps was transferred to nearby Graterford Prison when Eastern shut down. He's still there.
A visitor walking through the gift shop on the way out is reminded of the latest slogan of the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corp.: "Philly—You just can't do it in a day."
The inmates would have agreed.
Online Resources
Books
Find these books online at Borders.com.
Alcatraz Screw: My Years as a Guard in America's Most Notorious Prison
By George H. Gregory, University of Missouri Press, April 2002.
Battle at Alcatraz: A Desparate Attempt to Escape the Rock
By Ernest B. Lageson, Addicus Books, January 1999.
Hope Abandoned: Eastern State Penitentiary
Mark Perrott (photographer), Herbert Muschamp (Introduction), Prologue by Bette Bao Lord, Howell Press, July 2001.
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