At the beginning of 1970, the system of control that had prevailed for decades at the Washington State Penitentiary was about to collapse. By 1972, that system was only a memory. In this video, three men – Superintendent B. J. Rhay, prison chaplain Jim Cummins, and an inmate – talk about what convicts and staff both called “super custody.”
The Washington State Penitentiary was a dangerous place during the 1970s, and that danger affected the relationship between inmates. In the following story, an inmate who was president of the Black Prisoners Forum Unlimited (the B.P.F.U.) during the 1970s describes what it was like.
The prison auditorium was a dangerous place in the Washington State Penitentiary in the 1970s. In this audio tape, an inmate describes a near fatal assault when the lights went out.