Landmarks

Name: Eastern State Penitentiary
Brand: Paul Kahan
SKU: 9781596294035
Price: 21.99 USD
Availability: InStock

The Landmarks American history books series offers readers accessible, well-illustrated histories of USA landmarks and historic sites. Learn the secret history of the Chicken Ranch, Texas’s iconic brothel. Let loose at Detroit’s Rock’n’Roll palace, shop the hallowed shelves of Kaufmann’s, then relax at the Sandy Hook Highland beach resort. From the rise of Idlewild to the fall of Younkers, these Landmark books will bring iconic locations to your backyard. [View all Landmarks books]

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Eastern State Penitentiary

Paul Kahan

$21.99

The Burlington County Prison

Dennis C. Rizzo

$21.99

Joliet Prison Blues

Amy Kinzer Steidinger

$21.99

Sinners and Scandals of Laurel Hill Cemetery

Thomas H. Keels

$24.99

Frontier Kansas Jails

Paul Kahan

Eastern State Penitentiary

9781596294035

$21.99

The only comprehensive history of one of America's most infamous prisons, Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, PA.

Looming on the horizon like a storm cloud made of stone, the Eastern State Penitentiary spent more than a century as the fortress that both the law-abiding and criminal feared. In this superbly balanced and thoroughly researched volume, Paul Kahan presents the history of this revolutionary penitentiary, from its inception as a model of the revolutionary Pennsylvania System of incarceration in 1829 to the demands for its closure in the wake of ever-increasing violence in 1971. Through tales of spectacular escapes, official corruption, reformation and retribution, Kahan chronicles the tensions that plagued Eastern State since the arrival of its first prisoners.

Dennis C. Rizzo

The Burlington County Prison

9781609491055

$21.99

Built in 1811 in Mount Holly and intended to be a short-term holding facility, Burlington County Prison became one of the most notorious prisons of its time as criminals of all sorts spent days, years or lifetimes in its dungeon-like cells. Renowned architect Robert Mills designed the structure to be escape-proof, but more than a few prisoners overcame that challenge. Murderers, kidnappers, abusers, alcoholics, the mentally ill and other undesirables� served time here. Many were executed on the grounds, while others never left. From conception to construction, from criminal deviants to prisoners guilty of simply being poor, authors Dennis Rizzo and Dave Kimball explore the prison's past and present, the whole story of one of New Jersey's most well-known landmarks.

Amy Kinzer Steidinger

Joliet Prison Blues

9781467147354

$21.99

Named warden of the Illinois State Penitentiary in 1913, Edmund Allen arrived with a glamorous new wife and ambitious plans of reform that did away with years of striped uniforms and humiliating practices. Two years later, his wife was found murdered in her bed, shocking the country and throwing the prison into chaos. Over the past century, life behind bars at Joliet has often been a national spectacle. Infamous inmates like Leopold and Loeb, John Wayne Gacy, Baby Face Nelson and James Earl Ray drew headlines, and iconic scenes in movies like The Blues Brothers ensured that the prison walls themselves were instantly recognizable. From overlooked prisoner profiles to the kind of dramatic incidents that incited riots or inspired Hollywood, Amy Steidinger's stories cover the modern era of Old Joliet Prison.

Thomas H. Keels

Sinners and Scandals of Laurel Hill Cemetery

9781467171526

$24.99

Veteran guide and creator of the popular Sinners and Scandals of Laurel Hill Cemetery tour, Thomas H. Keels tells the spellbinding stories of thirteen unforgettable characters and unfolds Laurel Hill’s special place in Quaker City history.

Upon its founding in 1836, Laurel Hill Cemetery became the place to spend eternity for many of Philadelphia’s great and good, but alongside the luminaries interred in this Victorian necropolis lie shadier figures.

Philadelphia girl Mabel Tinley became one of the biggest grifters in Gay Nineties New York. Civil War general Henry Morris Naglee was denounced in the press as “a slayer of innocence and a robber of chastity.” The grisly death of Martha Drinnan, spinster daughter of the cemetery superintendent, remains an enduring mystery.

Veteran guide and creator of the popular Sinners and Scandals of Laurel Hill Cemetery tour Thomas H. Keels tells the spellbinding stories of thirteen unforgettable characters and reveals Laurel Hill's special place in Quaker City history.

Gerald J. Bayens

Frontier Kansas Jails

9781467137768

$21.99

Gunslingers, gamblers and outlaws vastly outnumbered sheriffs and marshals in the cattle towns of the Kansas frontier. Famous lawmen, such as Charlie Bassett, Wild Bill Hickok and Tom Smith, kept the peace by sheer force of personality and the integrity of the local lockup. The story of the state's settlement can be tracked in the fascinating development of these bastions of prairie justice. Makeshift jails of earlier times were replaced by limestone, brick and concrete structures with iron cells and elaborate locking systems. From the squirrel cage of Wichita to the iron jail of Lawrence City, tour these early Kansas prisons with author Gerald Bayens.

Judy Gail Krasnow

Jacktown

9781467135238

$21.99

Competing with the likes of Detroit and Ann Arbor, Jackson won the battle to build Michigan's first state prison in 1838. During the era of the Big House and industrial growth, the penitentiary's on-site factories and cheap inmate labor helped Jackson become a thriving manufacturing city. In contrast to Jacktown's beautiful Greco-Roman exterior, medieval punishments, a strict code of silence, no heat, no electricity and a lack of plumbing defined life on the inside. Author Judy Gail Krasnow shares the incredible stories of life at Jacktown, replete with sadistic wardens, crafty escapees, Prohibition's Purple Gang, a chaplain who ran a brothel and influential reformers.