Eastern State Penitentary- Nordin-3

While some of you were going to the website on Eastern State Penitentiary, my husband and I were in Philadelphia visiting it. We spent the whole day there and he took some pictures Here I am am at the front gate. The prison is HUGE and looks like a castle. The average sentence was 2 years and the first inmate was an 18 year old boy who stole a $20.00 gold piece and a watch

 

 Here I am unlocking one of the cells- It took four steps to unlock it. This is one of the guides that were scattered all over the prison to help and explain what we were seeing.

 

The place is very imposing and was meant to scare people so that they would behave!

 

 

Here is what they think Al Capone's cell might have looked like. They never took a picture of it so they got the description of it from a newspaper article and cannot verify the truthfulness of the newspaper at the time.

 

 

While it looks like they admitted prisoners to their cells through an iron gate- the first prisoners were admitted to their cells by way of the exterior exercise yard and the food was passed through these food doors from the interior of the prison. Later these were taken out and doors installed. I started with an self paced audio tour and then we had a guided tour in the afternoon. Very informative. The governor of Pennsylvania  sentenced a dog to life in this prison for killing his wife's cat and the sentence was carried out- a judge actually sentenced the dog and he was looked after by several inmates.

 

 Here is what it looks like from the center of the prison.