Virginia State Penitentiary: A Notorious History

Virginia State Penitentiary: A Notorious History PDF Author: Dale M. Brumfield
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1467137634
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Thomas Jefferson developed the idea for the Virginia State Penitentiary and set the standard for the future of the American prison system. Designed by U.S. Capitol and White House architect Benjamin Latrobe, the "Pen" opened its doors in 1800. Vice President Aaron Burr was incarcerated there in 1807 as he awaited trial for treason. The prison endured severe overcrowding, three fires, an earthquake and numerous riots. More than 240 prisoners were executed there by electric chair. At one time, the ACLU called it the "most shameful prison in America." The institution was plagued by racial injustice, eugenics experiments and the presence of children imprisoned among adults. Join author Dale Brumfield as he charts the 190-year history of the iconic prison.

Virginia State Penitentiary: A Notorious History

Virginia State Penitentiary: A Notorious History PDF Author: Dale M. Brumfield
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1467137634
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Thomas Jefferson developed the idea for the Virginia State Penitentiary and set the standard for the future of the American prison system. Designed by U.S. Capitol and White House architect Benjamin Latrobe, the "Pen" opened its doors in 1800. Vice President Aaron Burr was incarcerated there in 1807 as he awaited trial for treason. The prison endured severe overcrowding, three fires, an earthquake and numerous riots. More than 240 prisoners were executed there by electric chair. At one time, the ACLU called it the "most shameful prison in America." The institution was plagued by racial injustice, eugenics experiments and the presence of children imprisoned among adults. Join author Dale Brumfield as he charts the 190-year history of the iconic prison.

The Haunted History of the West Virginia Penitentiary

The Haunted History of the West Virginia Penitentiary PDF Author: Sherri Brake
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781452835044
Category : Haunted prisons
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Afterlife with no parole.If you die in prison, your soul stays in prison. At least that's what many inmates believed. 998 murders and suicides combined with 85 hangings and 9 electrocutions all make for a dark and violent past. The Cincinnati Ohio Enquirer called it a "Hell On Earth" in 1886. The New York Times branded it as "One of the Most Violent in the Country". Inmates called it "Bloody Alley" and for good reasons.The Haunted History of the West Virginia Pen is brought to light by Paranormal Investigator, Haunted Heartland Tours owner and author, Sherri Brake. Built in 1866 in Moundsville, West Virginia and situated on 10 acres, this mammoth fortress held some of the country's worst criminals. Explore Moundsville's bloody frontier history, the Grave Creek Mound, the building of the Pen, and the Wardens. Read first hand accounts from past guards and inmates along with newspaper articles, some collected from over 100 years ago. Accounts of executions, torture, escapes and notorious inmates are revealed. Examine over 100 ghostly accounts as paranormal investigators look for Shadow Men, ghosts and proof of the afterlife. Check out the Paranormal Directory and Vocabulary section. Use the Paranormal Guide to the Pen to help you investigate on site or simply read about the Sugar Shack, the Boiler Room and North Hall, all from the safety of your chair.This book is an excellent resource for gaining insight on the history and hauntings of this gothic prison. It is a first hand look into the dark dimensions of one of America's most haunted locations.

An Expendable Man

An Expendable Man PDF Author: Margaret Edds
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 0814722393
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
How is it possible for an innocent man to come within nine days of execution? An Expendable Man answers that question through detailed analysis of the case of Earl Washington Jr., a mentally retarded, black farm hand who was convicted of the 1983 rape and murder of a 19-year-old mother of three in Culpeper, Virginia. He spent almost 18 years in Virginia prisons--9 1/2 of them on death row--for a murder he did not commit. This book reveals the relative ease with which individuals who live at society's margins can be wrongfully convicted, and the extraordinary difficulty of correcting such a wrong once it occurs. Margaret Edds makes the chilling argument that some other "expendable men" almost certainly have been less fortunate than Washington. This, she writes, is "the secret, shameful underbelly" of America's retention of capital punishment. Such wrongful executions may not happen often, but anyone who doubts that innocent people have been executed in the United States should remember the remarkable series of events necessary to save Earl Washington Jr. from such a fate.

Virginia State Penitentiary

Virginia State Penitentiary PDF Author: Dale Brumfield
Publisher: History Press Library Editions
ISBN: 9781540226938
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description


Life at the West Virginia Penitentiary

Life at the West Virginia Penitentiary PDF Author: C. J. Plogger
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781545553756
Category : Correctional personnel
Languages : en
Pages : 156

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Book Description
The West Virginia Penitentiary was a harsh environment. It took a special person to work there. This book describes one such person. Her name is Maggie Gray. The book takes the reader into the prison and allows them to see what it was like to be a Correctional Officer in one of the most violent prisons.

Slavery by Another Name

Slavery by Another Name PDF Author: Douglas A. Blackmon
Publisher: Icon Books
ISBN: 1848314132
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 429

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Book Description
A Pulitzer Prize-winning history of the mistreatment of black Americans. In this 'precise and eloquent work' - as described in its Pulitzer Prize citation - Douglas A. Blackmon brings to light one of the most shameful chapters in American history - an 'Age of Neoslavery' that thrived in the aftermath of the Civil War through the dawn of World War II. Using a vast record of original documents and personal narratives, Blackmon unearths the lost stories of slaves and their descendants who journeyed into freedom after the Emancipation Proclamation and then back into the shadow of involuntary servitude thereafter. By turns moving, sobering and shocking, this unprecedented account reveals these stories, the companies that profited the most from neoslavery, and the insidious legacy of racism that reverberates today.

West Virginia Penitentiary

West Virginia Penitentiary PDF Author: Jonathan D. Clemins
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 9780738566955
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 132

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Book Description
In 1863, the newly formed West Virginia lacked a state penitentiary to house convicted felons. As a result, construction began in July 1866 on the West Virginia Penitentiary, the second public building constructed in the state. The infamous and foreboding West Virginia Penitentiary in Moundsville was known as one of the bloodiest institutions in the United States. With an extensive history of violence, the prison was ranked on the Department of Justice's Top Ten Most Violent Correctional Facilities list. Nearly 1,000 inmates perished within the stone walls of the prison, many of whom are said to still be serving their sentence, even after death. Many inmates were tortured, executed, murdered, or committed suicide. Plagued by these horrific events, the prison is a hotspot for paranormal activity. Images of America: West Virginia Penitentiary chronicles the fascinating history of a notorious prison from the planning stages to present day.

Race Man

Race Man PDF Author: Ann Field Alexander
Publisher: University of Virginia Press
ISBN: 0813921163
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 286

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Book Description
Although he has largely receded from the public consciousness, John Mitchell Jr., the editor and publisher of the Richmond Planet, was well known to many black, and not a few white, Americans in his day. A contemporary of Booker T. Washington, Mitchell contrasted sharply with Washington in temperament. In his career as an editor, politician, and businessman, Mitchell followed the trajectory of optimism, bitter disappointment, and retrenchment that characterized African American life in the Reconstruction and Jim Crow South. Best known for his crusade against lynching in the 1880s, Mitchell was also involved in a number of civil rights crusades that seem more contemporary to the 1950s and 1960s than the turn of that century. He led a boycott against segregated streetcars in 1904 and fought residential segregation in Richmond in 1911. His political career included eight years on the Richmond city council, which ended with disenfranchisement in 1896. As Jim Crow strengthened its hold on the South, Mitchell, like many African American leaders, turned to creating strong financial institutions within the black community. He became a bank president and urged Planet readers to comport themselves as gentlemen, but a year after he ran for governor in 1921, Mitchell's fortunes suffered a drastic reversal. His bank failed, and he was convicted of fraud and sentenced to three years in the state penitentiary. The conviction was overturned on technicalities, but the so-called reforms that allowed state regulation of black businesses had done their worst, and Mitchell died in poverty and some disgrace. Basing her portrait on thorough primary research conducted over several decades, Ann Field Alexander brings Mitchell to life in all his complexity and contradiction, a combative, resilient figure of protest and accommodation who epitomizes the African American experience in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Oregon State Penitentiary

Oregon State Penitentiary PDF Author: Diane L. Goeres-Gardner
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 143964859X
Category : True Crime
Languages : en
Pages : 128

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Book Description
As the only maximum-security prison in the state, the Oregon State Penitentiary (OSP) has housed some of the most violent criminals on the West Coast, including brutal serial killers Charley Panzram in 1915 and Jerry Brudos in 1969. Sixty men have been executed inside OSP. The prison was originally built in Portland in 1851 but moved to Salem 15 years later, after Oregon became a state. From that time forward, the Oregon State Penitentiary grew from 23 prisoners in 1866 to 1,912 by 1992. The penitentiary suffered several serious fires and riots. On March 9, 1968, the most expensive riot ever experienced in the United States flared inside the walls, causing over $2.5 million in damages. Numerous escapes plagued the prison until 1970, when security measures were tightened. The most famous escape involved Harry Tracy and David Merrill in 1902.

Haunted Asylums, Prisons, and Sanatoriums

Haunted Asylums, Prisons, and Sanatoriums PDF Author: Jamie Davis
Publisher: Llewellyn Worldwide
ISBN: 073873750X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
Recounts supernatural encounters from ten well-known U.S. institutions, including West Virginia Penitentiary and St. Albans Sanatorium, in a work that features photographs, highlights from site tours, and historical information.