Table of Contents

Introduction: Reconstructing the Life of a Prison Part I. Alcatraz from 1934 to 1948 1. The Federal Government's War on Public Enemies 2. A New Form of Imprisonment 3. Selecting the "Worst of the Worst" 4. The Program 5. Organized Resistance: A Regime Tested 6. Finding a Hole in the Rock: The First Escape Attempts 7. Alcatraz on Trial 8. The War Years 9. The Battle of Alcatraz Part II. Life on the Rock for Resisters and Public Enemies 10. Resistance and Adaptation 11. Outlaws among Outlaws 12. Celebrity Prisoners Part III. Alcatraz as an Experiment in Penal Policy 13. Return to the Free World 14. Lessons from Alcatraz for Supermax Prisons Epilogue Bibliographic Commentary Acknowledgments About the Authors

About the Author

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 Hawaii and has also coauthored with Ward, Women's Prison: Sex and Social Structure.

Reviews

"Enjoyable as well as informative. Anyone who has read it is unlikely to look upon the Rock quite the same way ever again." -- Martin Rubin San Francisco Chronicle "Alcatraz, as David Ward has re-created it, is irresistible to read about." -- Ben Pesta California Lawyer "Alcatraz: The Gangster Years deserves a place in the library of anyone or institution." -- Webb Johnson California Historian