I had the chance to stop by the Missouri State Penitentiary, named the “bloodiest 47 acres in America” by Time magazine....opened in 1836.... in April and just got around to editing these. I've had the creeps while editing but that could be nature of the images and the fact I'm watching Fox's new Sleepy Hollow alone in the dark while perusing these shots. The two tour guides were fun and entertaining, a former warden and a former jailer. When they took us down to solitary in the original jailhouse i got the heeby jeeby's! That's the super out of focus shot. Also the one they put us in and turned out the lights. Stuck in this teeny cell with 6 strangers and the ghosts of some seriously deranged humans I could feel nothing but terror. Mind you there were no locks or a gate on the door, just trapped by my fear. The gas chamber was horrific. The overall aura of the place was intense. There was one prisoner that was in solitary for 18 years, they brought him up once a year and the man held his sanity. The last year he was in solitary they brought him out and he worked with the new warden I think it was to write the new humane laws for solitary confinement.
John B. “Firebug” Johnson: In the 1880s, a man caught the public’s attention with his antics in prison. That man was “Firebug” Johnson, one of the most notorious of all the inmates to ever serve a sentence at the Penitentiary. Johnson attempted escape several times but was best known for his most notorious act; setting a fire that destroyed more than $500,000 worth of property and the deaths of several inmates. Johnson was then convicted of arson in a Cole County Court and given an additional 12 years after which he was locked in the dungeon for many years. After he was released, Firebug wrote a book entitled “Buried Alive for 18 Years in the Missouri Penitentiary.”
John B. “Firebug” Johnson: In the 1880s, a man caught the public’s attention with his antics in prison. That man was “Firebug” Johnson, one of the most notorious of all the inmates to ever serve a sentence at the Penitentiary. Johnson attempted escape several times but was best known for his most notorious act; setting a fire that destroyed more than $500,000 worth of property and the deaths of several inmates. Johnson was then convicted of arson in a Cole County Court and given an additional 12 years after which he was locked in the dungeon for many years. After he was released, Firebug wrote a book entitled “Buried Alive for 18 Years in the Missouri Penitentiary.”