By Randall Radic

Alcatraz.  The word means ‘pelican,’ and comes from the Arabic al-qatras, meaning ‘sea eagle.’  Almost everyone’s heard of it.  Clint Eastwood starred in a movie about escaping from Alcatraz.  Nicholas Cage and Sean Connery battled a misguided general in another movie called The Rock.

In 1850, President Millard Fillmore decided that Alcatraz Island would be used for military purposes. During the Civil War, the island had 85 cannons mounted around its perimeter and was used as the San Francisco Arsenal.  None of the cannons were ever fired and the only action the island saw was as a prison, where Confederate prisoners of war were held.

After the Civil War ended, the Army decided to continue using the island as a prison.  Then in October of 1933, Alcatraz was transferred to the Bureau of Prisons, which designated Alcatraz as a federal prison.  It soon became known as the harshest maximum-security prison in the United States.  And its inmates included the toughest and deadliest criminals, many of whom were notorious for their exploits:  Al Capone, Robert Stroud (The Birdman of Alcatraz), Machine Gun Kelly and Whitey Bulger.

In 1963, the Attorney General of the United States, whose name was Robert F. Kennedy, decided to shut down Alcatraz because the buildings were being eroded by salt water, the bay was being polluted by sewage from the prison, and the place was simply too expensive to run. 

David Ward has written the definitive history of Alcatraz.  The first of two planned volumes, Alcatraz:  The Gangster Years focuses on the years 1934 to 1948.  And while the book covers the stories of the men who were incarcerated there – bank robbers, kidnappers, and outlaws – the primary thrust of the book, the main character of the story, is The Rock.  Which means it’s the story of the prison designed “to hold and punish the nation’s criminal elite.”

As Ward states in his introduction, Alcatraz was intended to hold its inmates “to an iron regimen, reduce them to mere numbers, cut them off from the outside world, and keep them locked up securely for decades.”  The way this goal was accomplished makes for absorbing reading.  For the prison was literally shut-off from the outside world.  In other words, very little information was disseminated about what actually occurred on Alcatraz.  Which meant that many myths sprang up.

Getting at the truth is what Alcatraz is all about.  To do this, Ward not only chronicles the stories of the inmates, guards and wardens, but he also relates events and, most importantly, describes the culture that developed on The Rock.  As Ward delves into the story, he does not lose sight of the humanity of the inmates.  For although they were criminals, they were human beings.  It is this human-side of the story that causes Ward to ask pertinent questions:  how did the inmates adapt to their rigid environment?  Were any of the inmates rehabilitated?  And finally, the big question: Are such stringent measures “justified and necessary?”

Ward recounts the story in an objective manner, which is semi-scholarly in nature, yet entertaining because he writes in an simple style that is accessible to the average reader.  In other words, you don’t have to have a doctorate in criminal justice or penology to understand what’s going on.  Which means the reader can actually enjoy the book rather than suffering on the perpetual treadmill of erudite twaddle.  Or try it this way:  Alcatraz is not full of dry, stuffy, boring language ensconced in serpentine sentence structures that only a Cray supercomputer can decipher.

Thank goodness!

All that to say this:  Alcatraz is a darn good book about a very interesting subject written in a clear style.  Which means that on the Read-O-Meter, which ranges from 1 star (tedious) to 5 stars (winning), Alcatraz nabs 5 stars.          

David Ward is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the University of Minnesota. He is the coauthor (with Gene Kassebaum) of Prison Treatment and Parole Survival and coeditor (with Kenneth Schoen) of Confinement in Maximum Custody: New Last-Resort Prisons in the United States and Europe. Ward served as consultant to the U.S. House of Representatives' Committee on the Judiciary for an investigation at Alcatraz's successor, the Federal Penitentiary at Marion, Illinois, and is a member of a consultant group investigating prison gang policies in the California Department of Corrections.

Gene Kassebaum is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the University of Hawai'i and has also coauthored with Ward, Women's Prison: Sex and Social Structure.

Alcatraz:  The Gangster Years (University of California Press/ 2009)By David Ward with Gene Kassebaum

Randall Radic is a former Old Catholic priest. After a midlife crisis, he spent time behind bars. Today, he has emerged a changed man.  As the author of  Gone To Hell: True Crimes of America’s Clergy (ECW Press/ Oct 2009), Radic aims to warn the public of the sins committed behind the walls of churches every day.  Randall Radic is also author of A Priest in Hell: Gangs, Murderers and Snitching in a California Jail.

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