Alcatraz has been a jail, a worldknown jail, in the bay outside San Francisco, apporoximately 2,2 km from the coast. It was the Spanish researcher Juan Manuel de Ayala as in 1775 sailed into the bay with San Francisco, og he gave all the islands that he found there their names. The name Alcatraz is actually derived from Isla de los Alcatraces, and it means the island of the pelicans. In the beginning, there were birds, and the time that name Alcatraz was given nested many pelicans on the island.
Alcatraz was originally a fort, and was therefore used to military activities and military purposes. The military in the United States took the island for uses as “Fort Alcatraz” in 1859. They brought prisoners of war there from 1861, and here was southerb soldiers and crew of a captured merchant ship from the southern states interned during the American Civil War. In 1903, the prison was so dilapidated that it had to be closed. The planning of a new house started in 1906, but the big earthquake in San Francisco the same year implied that the construction took time, and it was not finished before in 1911.
The fort was discontinued in 1933. They then began the final rebuilding of a penitentiary, and the 1 January 1934, Alcatraz was turned into a federal prison. What made it particularly suitable as a prison was the icy water and the insidious and current conditions. Therefore, The Rock was a perfect places for people that were considered as there was a great danger of escape to. Alcatraz was in fucntion as high security prison to 1963. Among famous inmates persons were Al Capone (1934-39), Robert Stround (1942-1959), Machine Gun Kelly (1934-1951) and Alvin Karpis (1936-1962).
During the 29 years that Alcatraz was in use as a prison, there were 36 escape attempts. 15 persons that tried to escape, were killed during the attempt.
The only inmates who managed to escape from Alcatraz were Frank Lee Morris and the brothers John Anglin and Clarence Anglin. In the night of 11 June 1962, they escaped from the prison, and many people from different countries have not seen them since that time. It is still unclear what happened with them, either if they drowned or came themselves over to the mainland. No body has been found. Maybe, they are living today, and nobody in the media has revealed their human beings. But they can be living today, and they can have done no or some surgery on the body. And many people state that they are living today, and the statements come from their relatives. Robert Kennedy, an actual candidate to be president in the United States, said on CNN after this escape that USA has decided to close that prison! The prison Alcatraz was closed the 21 March 1963 due to maturity and high maintenance costs. Today, there is sightseeing around and into Alcatraz, and you and I can order tours and tickets to such trips.
To get out of the prison in 1962, the prisoners dug holes around the vent valve at the back of the cell to come out to a service hunting for sewer pipes and aeration. From there, they climbed three floors straight up and through an air ducts to the roof of the prison from which they descended, cut holes in the fence, and they paddle in a raft made of raincoats, 50 to 60 raincoats. The raft has never been found. But they have found pictures in the ocean from the land, from the raft, or from the Coast Guard. We can just speculate in what has happened with the three persons doing the escape from Alcatraz.
So as not to arouse suspicion, and to have best possible with time, the prisoners made a false air vent made of cardboard which they put in place in the hole after themselves to prevent that the hole from the cell was revealed. They also made a doll's head of toilet paper and newsprint and cement from the hole, and this head they lay down in the bed in the cell, so that the guards would not suspect until the next morning. All the prisoners knew about the escape from the three persons as mentioned, but nobody of the employees in the jail knew anything.
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