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    Missouri State Penitentiary
    Missouri State Penitentiary
    Missouri State Penitentiary
    Ebook151 pages37 minutes

    Missouri State Penitentiary

    By Arnold G. Parks

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    The Missouri State Penitentiary was established in 1833 via a bill passed by the state legislature, and the first prisoner was incarcerated in 1835. Inmates constructed the main prison building from rock quarried at the site in 1836. The penitentiary closed on September 15, 2004, and plans are in place to redevelop the site into offices for state agencies and private enterprises. The Missouri State Penitentiary was once considered one of the largest maximum-security penal institutions in the United States. After 550 serious assaults occurred inside the prison in the early 1960s, Time magazine called it “the bloodiest 47 acres in America” (although the walls of the penitentiary only contained 37 acres). The penitentiary had the distinction of housing some very famous individuals: boxing champion Sonny Liston learned to box there under the direction of the prison chaplain, infamous gangster Charles Arthur “Pretty Boy” Floyd spent time there, and James Earl Ray was an escapee when he shot and killed Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateDec 17, 2012
    ISBN9781439642467
    Missouri State Penitentiary
    Author

    Arnold G. Parks

    The rich history of Lincoln University is seen through images mostly taken from the extensive holdings of the archive in the university Ethnic Studies Center. Arnold G. Parks retired after teaching 28 years at Lincoln University. He now holds faculty rank as professor emeritus of sociology.

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      Missouri State Penitentiary - Arnold G. Parks

      Archives.

      INTRODUCTION

      Jefferson City, Missouri, named in honor of the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson, became the seat of government and Missouri’s capital city in the early 1820s, with the first capitol building completed in 1826. The Missouri General Assembly began holding formal sessions there around that time.

      Gov. John Miller worked extremely hard for the Missouri prison to be constructed in Jefferson City. His rationale was that a prison would help the city maintain its status as the seat of state government. A bill, which the legislature passed in 1833, established the penitentiary and mandated that it should be placed in Jefferson City.

      Master stonemason James Dunnica, who assisted with building the first capitol building in Jefferson City in 1826, was appointed to oversee construction of the new prison, and the Missouri Legislature appropriated $25,000 for the project. During construction in the 1830s, prisoners made bricks and worked in the construction of the facility. The initial prison population consisted of one guard, the warden, the first prisoners, the brick-making foreman, and his assistant. The first prisoner was incarcerated in 1835. There were 15 prisoners, with 11 from St. Louis, and all of them were incarcerated for larceny except one, who was imprisoned for stabbing a man during a drunken brawl.

      The prison, which formally opened in March 1836, was built on 37 acres. Enclosed by high stone walls, it was commonly referred to as The Walls. At one time, Missouri’s penitentiary was one of the largest penal institutions for maximum-security inmates in the United States and served as Missouri’s primary maximum-security institution. When the prison closed on September 15, 2004, it was listed as the oldest prison operating west of the Mississippi River. By contrast, the famous Alcatraz Prison in California at its maximum had 500-plus inmates, whereas the Missouri State Penitentiary at one time housed 5,200 inmates.

      The Missouri State Penitentiary, like many prisons in the United States, operated at one time under a behavior-control model known as the Auburn System, which confined inmates in separate cells at night but allowed them to work together during the day. Inmates were kept in strict silence and could not speak to each other without permission. The prevailing notion was inmates could be reformed if they were kept in solitary confinement under a rigid system of discipline. This strict control was no longer in force when the prison closed.

      By 1839, the Missouri General Assembly was concerned about the large amount of state funds used in maintaining the state’s prison operation; therefore, lawmakers decided that the rehabilitation of prisoners was less important than the state remaining financially solvent. Consequently, the state decided to lease the prison and its inmates to private citizens. The result was a practice whereby convict labor became a profit center for some enterprising local businesspeople. By 1900, there were 2,000 Missouri State Penitentiary inmates, making it the largest state prison in the United States; however, labor union protests began to chip away at the system of exploiting inmate labor, and in time this practice was stopped.

      Another distinguishing feature of the Missouri State Penitentiary during its existence from 1836 to 2004 was the violence that occurred within its stone walls. In the 1960s, popular national publication Time reported that the prison was the bloodiest 47 acres in America. While the main penitentiary complex was on 37 acres instead of 47, the reference to violent behavior inside the walls was probably correct given the stabbings and other crimes against people cited in reports. Some have reasoned that because the prison was the state’s only maximum-security penal institution, violence occurred because there was no other place to house the worst of the worst. Not only was inmate violence evident, but also the amount of contraband discovered in the prison added to the negative atmosphere that circled the prison community. In the fall of 1996, a couple of members of the prison staff devised a plan to help

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