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Eastern State Prison

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A shadow cast from the massive castle wall meets you as you stride down the street. But the castle wasn’t a castle at all, it was a former prison, Eastern State Penitentiary to be exact. Approaching the front gate, looking away from the wall is nearly impossible. The wall was made of large stones, the color of faded grave stones, piled one on top of the other, and intertwined like a miss matched puzzle that had been cemented together. Along the walls patches of vines run up the length, attempting to escape to freedom. With the stone walls towering thirty feet above the ground, and ten feet below, it is easy to lose yourself in the structure that was Eastern State, much like many of the prisoners who were treated in solitary. Eastern State …show more content…

The use of solitary confinement to help rehabilitate the inmates. The idea was that while these criminals were in solitary they would be able to think more clearly about the crime they had committed, giving them time to repent, and so they would be able to receive penitence. Yet in reality the silence of the prison didn’t help the prisoners. Now studies have found keeping a prisoner isolated for long amounts of time can lead to more damage than good. Many men have been found to have become violently insane during their stay at Eastern State. Solitary is still used today in prisons but as a punishment, and the prisoners aren’t keep for long periods of time because of the dangers it could cause to their mental …show more content…

Maybe the original idea was intended to help “straighten” out the prisoners. These criminals were thought to be missing a part of themselves, and through work, silence, and darkness they would be able fully realize the awfulness of their crimes and truly repent. Surrounded by perfection in each brick that was placed. Or were these high ceiling meant for so much more? They stand perfectly rounded close to twenty feet high, every few steps there are long paneled windows in the roof. Each window is outfitted with the mesh wiring throughout. It would seem Haviland was prepared for anything. Maybe these rounded ceiling were another way to keep the criminals inside the prison. With curved ceiling such as these there is no way for someone to escape through the window, which just so happens to be reinforced, just in case. With ceiling as high as these a comforting warmth is hard to find. These halls were made for ventilation, now with most of the building condemned it would be hard to know if the breezes of chilled wind are due the cracks and creaks that run throughout or because the heat just rises leaving coldness in its

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Some inmates called it the “ snake den “ maybe because a prisoner got bitten by a snake while in there ( Murphy 1999 ). The dark cell which was a room that was fifteen feet by fifteen feet and contained an iron cage, the only source of light they had came from a small vent in the ceiling that is a reason why it was nicknamed the dark cell. Contact with any other inmates while in the dark cell was forbidden. The longest someone spent in the “ dark cell “ was one hundred and twenty days, the inmate never spent a day in there again! Furthermore while in the cell, they were only given bread and water once a day.

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Prison housed a diverse and unique range of different kinds of inmates. The townspeople of Yuma, Arizona perceived the Yuma territorial prison as a favorable and luxuries prison. The townspeople of Yuma, Arizona even called the Yuma Territorial prison the “Country Club on the Colorado” because of the benefits it gave the inmates and the community. One reason the prison was perceived in this way was because the cloths the inmates warn were a heave blue and white striped shirt and pants .

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1186 Words | 5 Pages

In the 1800s, the mentally ill and prisoners were forced to live in wretched conditions and often were not even treated as regular citizens. Patients of mental institutions were operated on so they were more controllable. The mentally insane that did not live at home were kept in prisons, few were in faulty poorhouses, and even fewer were in hospitals. Many hospitals had mental wards, but they were inadequate for patients. In the 1840s, Dorothea Dix visited many prisons where the deranged were kept and found that these conditions were unsuitable for living quarters (“Dorothea Dix Biography”).

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1537 Words | 7 Pages

The guards would have guard towers mounted at the top of the prison walls so that they could watch for any mischief or kerfuffles. There was an instance where one of the guards dropped their gun off of the guard tower and one of the prisoners returned it without any question. This came to show that people can change for the better in this place. The prison was very confined. The outside wall was 18 feet tall, 8 feet thick and 5 feet thick at the top.

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75 Words | 1 Pages

Solitary confinement, in my opinion, is cruel and unusual punishment. If there was not a mental-health crisis in America, and there was in fact a rehabilitation-focused prison system, solitary confinement would be greatly reduced and used much more sparingly. What is the point of driving people to madness by putting them in isolation? It would be so much cheaper for tax payers to change the system to a more effective one that actually reduces

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488 Words | 2 Pages

In Atul Gawande “ HellHole” essay they talked about the experiences and effects of people who were previously in solitary confinement. Solitary confinement can be best explained as the process of removing an individual and isolating them from their environment and socialization. Atul Gawande is specifically talking about prisoners of war and incarcerated people and how their experience was and that process. The essay talked about how people are put in isolation which caused them to act out of their character. Goffman would argue that effects of solitary confinement are exactly what total institutions can do to a person's.

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It also provides support for those who believe solitary confinement should not be a punishment in jail. It has

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This looks like a prison, Yuki thought to herself as she followed her “guide” and the rest of her family into the barrack. Yuki nervously stepped inside her new home taking in all the details. Even in the barrack you still couldn’t seem to escape the dust. The walls were stained by the color of the Earth. The wooden floors had a thin layer a dust that bursted through the air with each step Yuki took.

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766 Words | 4 Pages

First you hate them, then you get used to them. Enough time passes, you get so you depend on them. That 's institutionalized.’ A prison should aim at retribution, incapacitation, deterrence and rehabilitation. I am very well convinced that prison has served its first three purposes by depriving offenders’ freedom, but the

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637 Words | 3 Pages

This is the second prison because it is a prison located in a big state. Sing Sing prison was opened in 1829. Sing Sing’s name comes from an Indian phrase sin sinck. This phrase means stone on stone. The prison was able to hold 800 prisoners at a time.

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1062 Words | 5 Pages

The Penitentiary was the most expensive and famous prison. It was built in 1829 and closed in 1970, but opened for a brief year when a riot broke out in a nearby prison. The Penitentiary was known for its grand architecture and its strict discipline. The Penitentiary was designed to enforce regret and penitence. It used a system of solitary confinement where inmates did everything in their cell.

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1558 Words | 7 Pages

The prison hasn’t just been used to provide a building, but its been used for it’s material and has been slowly torn apart. Piece by piece through time, parts of the prison have been torn down. In 1916, there was a flood in Yuma and what the townspeople used to rebuild were parts from the prison (Murphy 1). In order for the Southern Pacific Railroad to be built the western walls and the woman's cells had to be destroyed in 1923 (The Yuma Territorial Prison). More destruction was made when the hospital in the prison and the Mes Hall were burned down in 1924 (The Yuma Territorial Prison).

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741 Words | 3 Pages

The prisoners went through the same schedule every day and if they didn’t follow regulation, they were sent to spend isolation for days,weeks, or even months. Prisoners slowly went insane as “The Rock” beat them down to nothing. Thirteen escape attempts involving 33 men all ended tragically. But one attempt involving Frank Morris, Allen West, and Clarence and John Anglin will always be

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353 Words | 2 Pages

Some might argue that solitary confinement is actually effective and has its benefits, however this is not the case since this punishment only seems to make criminals much more dangerous when they leave prison than they were before and research shows that inmates who left solitary confinement experience increased anger and end up committing the kind of criminality that society is looking to prevent by using this method of punishment. Thus, solitary confinement ultimately fails as a rehabilitative measure, and as a way to "settle down" problematic

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557 Words | 3 Pages

This focus on confinement is reflected in the use of repetitive language, which underscores the feeling of being trapped. The use of the phrase "doors, doors, doors" highlights both the abundance of doors and the sense of claustrophobia the protagonist feels. The phrase "locked and bolted" adds to the sense of hopelessness because it adds to the idea that there is no escape from the castle. The protagonist is completely trapped, with no escape route available.

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