Alcatraz: The OG Scary Island
37:53 Share

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? Well, with a name-year price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states.

Mochi Health is a long-term weight loss solution personalized to fit your unique needs and goals. Meet one-on-one with board-certified obesity doctors and registered dietitians who are on a mission to listen. Eligible patients can access custom-formulated GLP-1 medications at an affordable set price and get them delivered to their home each month. No insurance required. FSA and HSA accepted. With

With 24-7 customer service available, Mochi Health is here to partner with you on your journey to a healthier life. Take the free quiz at joinmochi.com and use code AUDIO40 at checkout for $40 off your first month of membership. That's joinmochi.com. Today, Tess, we are going to dive into one of the most notorious prisons you've ever heard of.

I'm sure you've heard of so many prisons. She's in her reputation era, Alcatraz. Alcatraz is definitely in her reputation era. We were talking about the one, the only, Alcatraz.

Wow. Wow, Bethany, wow. Wow, Bethany, wow. Tess, what do you know about Alcatraz? Because when I started researching, I was like, oh, damn, this is a San Francisco story, and I'm taking it for my San Francisco girly. No, but I love when you do Bay Area stories. Like, I think you do Bay Area stories more than I do, and I really, like, love that. Yeah, we have Patty Hearst.

And that might be it. Oh, well, Manson, they started out, Charles Manson, they started out in the Bay. Yes. And I'm always like, tell me about my heritage. Yeah.

Yeah. And I've done like maybe one or two, but like, I love when you, I love when you teach me, I don't know much about Alcatraz. I mean, all crime stuff has been Bay area. Pretty much. The area was like heavy on the, also Zodiac is Bay area. The Zodiac killer. Yeah. And, um, the, uh, what is the one he got caught? The California, what's the American word for it? What's the American word for, um, Golden State killer. That,

That's right, the one who was on the microphone or whatever? No, that's Richard Hurst, I think is his name. Oh, that's right. The USA killer was a serial killer that they couldn't find, and then DNA testing, they were able to find him. That's right. That's crazy. God, Barry has some darkness to it. Yeah, it really does. But I don't know much about Alcatraz. I know that it's a prison.

That, I don't know when it was built or anything, but it's out in the ocean or the bay. It's like, what does Linda Thompson say? She's like, the ocean. Look at the ocean out there. And we're all going to be dead someday. And whenever I think of Alcatraz, I think of Shutter Island with Leo. Was it based off of Alcatraz? I don't know Shutter Island was, but do you know what was based off of Alcatraz? Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter. Yeah.

Oh, interesting. That's a good one. That's a dark one. Yeah, no, truly. And it makes sense. Like, Azkaban was, you know, the worst of the worst on its own little island. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's all I know. Wow. I'm so excited. I mean, like, I've seen it so many times from afar, you know? Yeah, have you ever been and have you toured? No, I've not. Well, our next Ramy field trip. Yeah, I feel like there was an option to do it in college, and I was like, no. Yeah.

You're like, I'd rather do something a little more chic, you know? I'm like, I just can't deal with that mentally. Yeah. But I really can't take that on right now. I'm in my work. No, I would love, again, like we've been saying this for a long time, a show kind of like Giggly Squad, like what they just did, but where we go to like the different RAM sites. So we can go to Alcatraz. We can go to the Tower of England and see where Anne Boleyn was hanging out. It'd be so fun. Hanging out. Hanging out, literally. You can do it over to me.

Where she was chilling. Where she was just, like, hanging with her girls, you know? Yeah, she was being girly. Yeah, she was being girly at the Tower of England before her fateful death. Yeah, I would love to do that. But Alcatraz has always been really interesting to me. I think people are actually very interested in prison life and, like, what goes on there because it's, like, one of the only places that, like, you don't want to go and you don't really know about it unless you're there. Yeah. Like, I've told this story...

When I first moved to L.A. and I had no friends, my Friday nights and Saturday nights I would stay in and watch Locked Up. I think it was on CNBC. Maybe MSNBC. No, one of those things. And it's just fascinating. It is fascinating because it just feels very – it's unlike anything we've experienced yet. Yes.

Well, maybe one day we'll be traveling. We'll go to prison. Exactly. Well, we did say that if we were in Alcatraz, we would be calling Adrian, Tessa's brother, of course, who gets us out of everything. Be like, Adrian, we're in Alcatraz. Like, what do we do? How do we get out? And he like would help. He would get us out somehow. I know he would. Yeah.

And Tess and I have also already talked about if we were in prison, our contraband of choice would be spray tan solution. We would need a spray tan, but we'd have to really perfect it so that the orange wouldn't – remember like the red curtain that we had during our live show and we looked crazy with our spray tan because of the colors? Of course. So we needed to do that like shade four from Sugared and Bronze so it's more of a green undertone. Like literally, remember Evan being like – I was like, did we look too tannish? What did he say? He was just like, babe, it was rather shocking. But I was like, okay.

If we're going to have our first live show and we're going to be talking about Jessica Simpson, you think that we're not going to be way too tan? Honey, we're going to push it to the limit.

Just like Jessica did. Of course, of course. And again, method acting. Of course. Truth or false? She really was. Yeah, I'm so excited to learn about everything. But I don't know. Well, on Alcatraz, we're going to talk about where it came from, how it became a prison, who was there, any escape attempts. We're going to talk about it all. We're going to mention it all. Don't you worry. Aren't the Kardashians go at one time, right? And that's what Kourtney's like, I'd hook up with that one. Right? Right.

I'm going to Alcatraz? I mean, Alcatraz is no longer an active prison. But you can go to Torret. Yeah, you can go to Torret. So maybe. And there was like pictures of different people that had been there and she was like, hot. I was like, that's literally us going to Alcatraz. That's so raincoated. Actually, I was looking at some of the prisoners, like some of the escape attempts and I was like, huh. Because you know,

Because, you know, sometimes you're like, that face is so not a modern face. And then you see some pictures and you're like, you could be down the street at El Chucho right now, my favorite bar. Wow, it's so true. Yeah, yeah. So anyways, you know, homeboy could get it, some of those prisoners in Alcatraz. But okay, so my sources, Chess, are like very scholarly. Detroit Free Press, Britcona, Wikipedia, The Associated Press.

History.com and chat GPT. Wow. She's scholarly. She's a real journalist for this one. Real journalism, honey. Alcatraz is infamous as the prison for the worst of the worst. The murderers. The mob bosses. Men who couldn't be controlled anywhere else. Oh, shit. Yeah. It was like if you...

where, you know, if you're bad, you got sent to prison. If you were bad in prison, you got sent to Alcatraz. Because it was so hard to escape from? Yeah, that was one of the reasons because it's located on a cold, isolated rock where escape was considered impossible. It held America's most notorious criminals, including Al Capone, George Machine Gun Kelly. What?

I was waiting for your reaction. Okay, so there was a gangster named George Machine Gun Kelly. Oh, that's how he has his name. And that's how he has his name. But wouldn't Machine Gun Kelly also be at Alcatraz? He really would. That man has some darkness, but that kind of gives me the ick for some reason about him. A hundred percent. He's like, I'm going to take it from an old gangster. I'm a gangster. He's giving. Tell me. No, I can't. I can't say. Okay. You know who we were talking about yesterday?

No, but we'll talk offline. We'll talk offline. Okay. And then it became a symbol of punishment at the most extreme. So, okay. So let's start with how it got its name. Like, where did this whole thing come from?

So, yes, it is perched on a fog-covered island in the middle of San Francisco Bay. The island itself is 22 acres, which, like, I never really know what that means. That's big. No, it is big. Like, in Arkansas, I feel like someone would be like, I'm on, like, three acres of land. In L.A. It's like a big farm. Yeah, exactly. I guess so. So, sure, yeah. It's like a rocky island. It's surrounded by really, really cold, really, really choppy, strong currents. Okay.

And sharks? Okay. So, Tess, wow, maybe you do know all about Alcatraz. It's coming back to me now. Like, the sharks are sharking, aren't they? Well, so that's, I think it was part of, like, a scare tactic because it is full of sharks, but it's not full of, like, human-eating sharks. It's full of, like, the little ones. It's full of the little ones?

The little ones? It's full of the little ones that, like, want nothing to do with you. But, of course, you're going to tell all the prisoners, like, it's surrounded by sharks. Also, like, whether they want to eat me or not, like, I don't really want to swim with them. A shark is a shark, okay? People that are like, these ones are, like, the gentle ones. I'm like, I would lose my mind. Absolutely not. And poop my pants if I saw one in the middle of the bed. You heard it here first.

And also, like, I think I didn't realize this until I visited San Francisco of how freaking cold it is, like year round. And especially if it's like in the middle of this ocean, the water is frigid. Even in like the summer. Well, the summer is very cold, but it's cold all the time. I took a tour of Haight-Ashbury with my aunt and cousins. And she was like, I think you're going to want more of a jacket. So I was wearing a dress. I was like, it's the middle of June. No, I was shivering. The coldest winter I ever spent was the summer in San Francisco.

Wow. That sounds like the name of a novel. Robert Frost, I believe. Oh, is it actually? Or Oscar Wilde, one of them. Oh, I was like, Tess, that was really poetic and beautiful. No, no, no. No. No, please. I can't take credit. Wow. Hi. Yeah. So it is out in the middle of nowhere. It's about three miles from the Golden Gate Bridge. A long swim. Yeah, exactly. That's like three miles. It doesn't sound that long, but when you're swimming in strong currents, it's...

That could take hours. It could take years. Like literally. God. Yeah. So how the hell did this creepy little island become a prison? Well, let's go all the way back to 1775, shall we? Okay. So there was a Spanish explorer, Juan Manuel de Isla, and he cruises through the bay. He sees another island and he calls it La Isla de los Alcatraz.

And that translates to the islands of Pelican from the archaic Spanish, Pelican is Alcatraz. And so the Pelicans were on this island. They're like, yeah, we run this ship.

And then an English guy comes along. His name's Captain Beachy. He rolls through later. He sees a different island. And he also sees a ton of birds on that island. And he's like, well, I heard about the Alcatraz Island. I'll just name this one Alcatraz as well. Keep it clean. Instead of La Isla de Alcatraz, we're just going to do Alcatraz. So basically.

A explorer's named this island, okay? Classic. Classic. So then the U.S. takes over Alcatraz because at the time it was Mexican territory. In 1849, after the Mexican-American War, California becomes U.S. territory, and they also build the first West Coast lighthouse on Alcatraz in 1854. Oh, lovely. A little fun fact.

And the government was just like, yeah, this isolated rock is perfect for military stuff. So they start building a fort. And then by 1858, 200 soldiers are sent to live there.

And God, I'm sure that they were like, we're going to go live on an island? Amazing. And then it's just like freezing. Depressing. Full of birds. It's not the place you want to be. No, absolutely not. It's starting to just become a military base. And then the Civil War breaks out in 1861. And I know this might sound dumb, but I don't even associate California being a part of our country while the Civil War is breaking out. Yeah, I don't either. I thought California came up in like...

Like yesterday. I don't want to say. No, definitely like. I associate it with like a little bit later in the 1800s, but it was a part of the union, of course. Of course, California is part of the union, not the Confederacy. Come on. Always been chic. Always been chic. Always been liberal ahead of her time. California is so hot. California is so hot.

So they're a part of the Union, and then Alcatraz becomes the Union stronghold, and they just put a bunch of cannons on Alcatraz because it was actually to defend the San Francisco Bay from Confederate attacks. Obviously, we know the Civil War didn't make it as far as California. That would have been crazy. Oh, God. Yeah.

But they were like, just in case, we need to be prepared. And the vibes were just tense in general, obviously. And this is also when the island starts seeing their first prisoners because they would lock up Confederate sympathizers, Confederate soldiers, because, yeah, and even Union soldiers accused of treason. Oh, damn. And...

Well, obviously they'd have to get them out there just by a boat. Like a little tugboat. It was by a boat. Exactly. Remember the tugboats from our Titanic episode? Okay. Like what'd they say again? They said, you kill girls.

You go, girl. Yeah, so I guess there were some Confederate soldiers that escaped. That area would go to California, and then they would get locked up at Alcatraz. And just assholes who were Confederate sympathizers in general. But sadly, it's not just Confederate soldiers being sent there because they also started putting people

in prison that were Hopi Native American men and they put them in Alcatraz in the 1870s because they refused orders to send their children away from their families to the Indian boarding schools. That's what they were called.

I feared that Alcatraz would take a dark turn. This part -- I mean, our country has such dark history. I mean, we just talked about the Civil War. But these Indian boarding schools are such a stain on our country's history. If you don't know, they were government and church run institutions in the United States and Canada that were designed to forcibly assimilate indigenous children into white Euro American culture, often through cruel and abusive methods.

Oh my God. And also like that just made me think like to romanticize California as like this perfect place. Like it definitely was not. And California has not been kind to indigenous people. Exactly. Like this is, this is, it's still a part of our country. It's still been going on. And so they would send these native Americans and force the Bible and white culture down their throat. And it's, and then it's genocide. It's really disgusting. And, and,

Sad. So unfortunately, those were also prisoners at Alcatraz. And then it just pretty much stays a war prison for a long time. They just keep building it out, building barracks. And during World War I, the prison was used to hold conscientious objectors. So they were like, oh, you don't want to fight in the war? You can rot in hell in Alcatraz. That'd be me. I'd be like, I...

We're contacts. Yeah. Well, I'm also, like, curious of, like, because you could be a conscientious objector in Vietnam, but you definitely didn't get sent to prison. So I'm, like, curious of when that started happening. Oh, yeah. What would be the... I think that...

You could just be like, that's completely against everything I believe in. I'm not going to do it. And then, but I don't know. But I thought that for Vietnam, that's something like my mom said that my grandma was like pumping. Yeah. Because people did do a lot of stuff to, um, to not say draft. Oh, that makes sense. But I think you could also, I don't know what qualifies. Listen, we have a whole draft episode and it was from years ago. You guys can go listen. We do listen to our draft episode. So maybe we'll answer our own question there. But yeah, for,

For World War I you were going to Alcatraz if you were a conscientious objector. Damn.

This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. Not everyone is careful with your personal information, which might explain why there's a victim of identity theft every five seconds in the U.S. Fortunately, there's LifeLock. LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points a second for threats to your identity. If your identity is stolen, a U.S.-based restoration specialist will fix it, guaranteed, or your money back. Save up to 40% your first year by visiting LifeLock.com slash podcast. Terms apply.

Thank you.

Hello, I'm Heather McDonald, stand-up comic and pop culture expert and the host of my podcast, Juicy Scoop. If you're obsessed with Hollywood romances, reality TV drama on and off camera, and celebrity gossip, this is the show for you. In each episode, I dive into the juiciest, most salacious, and

controversial pop culture stories of the moment. And I give my opinion in the most comedic way. It's based on my own Hollywood experiences working on television shows and of course my own experiences with the actual stars themselves. You're also going to hear from a range of guests from actors to comedians

to comics to reality stars like Countess Luann from New York Housewives or Jax Taylor from Vanderpump Rules and now The Valley. So if you want the scoop on the hottest gossip, you've come to the right place. Tune into Juicy Scoop wherever you get your podcasts. You'll thank me later. What Alcatraz is really known for, though, is the gangster years. Okay? And this is in 1934 through like 1959, 1960, something like that. But it starts in 1934. Okay.

Now, if you listen to our Bonnie and Clyde episode, if you listen to our Prohibition episode on premium, that was our first episode, guys, that we ever did was Prohibition. And it was so bad that we were like, we can't release this. But it is on premium. It couldn't have been better. We didn't know what we were doing. We were so nervous. The sound was crazy because we were recording in maybe one of the worst options to record in a space. Yeah.

We were just babies. Like we had no idea what we're doing. Just babies. But I did learn a lot from it. And one of the things that I did learn is that there was a lot of crime in the twenties and our Bonnie and Clyde episode. There's a lot of crime in the thirties because prohibition. So you had a ton of bootleggers and then, um, in the thirties we had the great depression. So you have like bank robbers, all of, all of that stuff.

So the government was like, Taylor Armstrong, enough with the crime. You guys are getting out of hand. And they were like, we need a place to keep the baddest of the bad. And we also need a place just to send the annoying inmates who are like getting on our nerves and also like trying to escape, all of that shit. So they were like, you know what? That island in California is perfect.

So the United States Department of Justice acquired Alcatraz on October 12th, 1933, and the island became a federal prison in August of 1934. Damn. And then tests at 940 a.m. on August 11th, 1934, the first batch of 137 prisoners arrives at Alcatraz and they arrived by railroad, um,

from the United States Penitentiary in Kansas to California. So, of course, I was like, well, how long was that train ride? Oh, God. Can you imagine? In August? Just knowing where you're going to of just like, well. Yeah. And it just must have been so freaking hot and like stinky. Tinky. Tinky men. It took 39 to 42 hours. Wow.

And how big was Alcatraz at the time? How many could it fit? They could fit, I think, like 250 prisoners. It was around that area, but they only had like 150 prisoners at the time. But it was huge. They had buildings everywhere, and we'll get more into that. But they filled up the island with buildings. Damn.

Yeah, and so on this round, on the first round, it was 137 prisoners.

And then, well, just like when I first started Googling, like, how long was the train ride, the suggestion that came up was how long was the train ride from Hogwarts. I'm like, you guys. You're like, sometimes we need to separate, okay? We need to, like, calm it down a little bit. We need to let it go. We really do. Okay, so these prisoners were escorted to Alcatraz while handcuffs and high security coaches and guarded by 60 FBI agents and U.S. Marshals.

Most of the prisoners were notorious bank robbers and murderers. And the warden was James A. Johnston, and he was considered to be an Iron Man. What does warden always remind you of? The warden. I mean...

I think of, this is not going to be what you're thinking of at all. I think of The Longest Yard with Adam Sandler. I think of Holes. Of course. Okay, so here's the thing. I love that movie and I can't watch that movie now, I don't think, because of the overhead shots of the holes. Oh, I didn't even think about that for you. I just can't watch it because it makes me feel like sick to my stomach, but I used to love it. I mean, the movie is incredible and the soundtrack. Digging at uh-ohs.

digging up. I remember being like, this is the blues. I was just like, shit. It's like a nine-year-old. It's like a nine-year-old

But like being so attracted to Shia LaBeouf as a child, watching that being like he is the cutest thing I've ever seen. Truly, he is the talent of our generation. He has so many demons. I don't agree with a lot of things he's done in his life. What I am just saying is that he is extremely talented. Our friend goes to the same – their kids go to the same preschool, and she's like, I stalk him literally every pickup. How could you not? But that movie is amazing. So Gordian Weaver – Great cast. Angelina Jolie's dad –

Oh, that's right. John Voight. John Voight. Eartha Kitt, I think. Damn. Yeah, I don't know why. I just can't. I can't watch it. I know. I don't want to for some reason. I might do a rewatch soon. Oh, my God. Patricia Arquette. Wow. I can fix that. The warden. The warden. The warden. Yeah. What a chic. It is a chic word. It is. And this guy was what you would picture a warden being. He had a three-piece suit on every single day. Mustache. Mustache.

Probably. I assume also like little, the tiny sunglasses, if you guys are watching on YouTube, like the circle sunglass or not sunglasses, but yeah. I know what you mean.

The glasses. He was very disciplined. He insisted on absolute order. He believed in firm control, but not cruelty. It's interesting because I did see an account that he was into prison reform, which was very ahead of their time. At this time in the 30s, we are just sending people to rot in jail. Yeah, I can't imagine anyone being like, you know what? Is this right? Why don't we teach people life skills?

Yeah. But I did see accounts that he did do that. I don't know if that was later in his career because it definitely wasn't happening in Alcatraz. Yeah. Yeah. So he was also like, I'm going to show them that I'm not afraid of them because if you're a warden of Alcatraz, you have to be like –

Intimidating. Yeah, big dick energy for sure. Truly. He ate at the dining hall, but one of the prisoners one time slit his throat with the end of, where is it? It's a spoon handle or something like that. He attacked him, slit his throat because- Because it can get sharp, like even plastic, right? No, I mean, you will figure it out. Yeah, you figure it out. Was plastic around in the 30s? What else would they be-

I think like silver. Oh, right. Like actual silver. What else would you – Like eating with their hands? Yeah. So he gets attacked because he was unguarded. Oh, spoon handle. Yeah. Has his throat slit, but he survived. And then he was like, I'm going to immediately go back into the dining hall to show them I'm not scared of them, and I still don't want bodyguards. Whoa.

Whoa, that is a power move. Yeah, which I'm like, sweetheart. I'm like, honey, your pride. Like, it's fine to have a bodyguard if your throat was just slit. One, at least. Also, I'd be like, I definitely just want to go eat in my office and watch Netflix. I'd be like, I'm going to quit this job because I'm not, it's not for me. This is not made for me. But you know what was crazy? Speaking of like bodyguards and other staff, the staff and their family lived on Alcatraz. Yes.

That's what I was going to say because you're not making that commute every night, right? No, not every day except the kids because them and their families, the kids did use a ferry to go to school every day. But their houses were – like their main residences were there? Not only was their main residence there, they had a small grocery store, a bowling alley, a social hall, apartments. Oh, no.

It's like, it was truly its own little island, which don't you think that the groceries must have been so expensive? So it's like Hawaii. We learned that the hard way on your bachelorette trip. We sure did. Yeah. So it's just so crazy to imagine like all these families, there was 11 apartments, nine single rooms for bachelors. And by the time, uh, it opened, there were 52 families living on Alcatraz, including 126 women and children. Wow.

Wow, I always imagined it just like one prison, like that takes up the whole island. But I guess people, you got to house the employees. Yeah, and people actually, like there wasn't a huge turnover rate for the guards at Alcatraz because they were like, we get to live on this nice little island. We have job security. Oh, they liked it? I love it. Yeah, they loved it. And all the families reported feeling very safe because inmates weren't allowed near the residential areas and security was extremely tight. Okay.

But you ever see the sun? I was like, God, it just must be gloomy as hell. Yeah, I guess I don't really know. On that island, like, is it just gloomy? I mean, they did say it was, like, so cold and... It's so foggy and gloomy because, like, you're, like, right, like, close to the Golden Gate Bridge. That's where, like, you literally get, like, no sun. Well, I just would feel so isolated and, like, would never want to do that. No. Yeah. That's not for us. But...

So it was lovely for those like guards and all that stuff. But what was Alcatraz like for the prisoners? And this is where I'm like, give me all the details. Yeah. Okay. So the prison cells were designed so that none of the walls face the outside world or whatever, which is smart. It typically measured nine feet by five feet and the ceilings were seven feet high.

seven feet high. So your head, Oh God. Yeah. The claustrophobia, the claustrophobia. It's so small. Um, the cells had a bed, a desk, which I'm like, where do you even fit that desk? A wash bin, a toilet. Um, and the,

On the back wall and a few furnish... Yeah, it didn't really have any furnishings except a blanket. So it's basically just like a bed. Like, we'll put pictures on the carousel, but there's not a lot going on there. I'm so curious to see now. Yeah, it's gross. It's disgusting looking. They had no privacy. This is going to trigger you. They had no privacy in going to the toilet. I...

Had this realization recently in life. Yeah. Yeah. Everyone's watching you go to the toilet and they said it smells so bad because the toilets were just in the cells. And also it was flushed with salt water. Oh, God. And this says hot water taps weren't installed until the early 1960s, but shortly before closure. So I'm pretty sure that means they didn't have hot water to shower with.

How cold? I mean, so cold. I can't imagine in the winter. Like, if it's that cold in the summer, no thank you. And you know that they probably had, like, the thinnest, like, most uncomfortable blankets to sleep on. Exactly. Like, itchy. Yeah. Again, like, this place is designed to, like, break people, and like that it did. Okay, so here's a typical schedule in Alcatraz. 6.30 a.m., wake up. 7 a.m., breakfast in total silence. There was no talking outside of designated areas. Okay.

So yeah, basically silence most of the day. Oh my God. Yeah. 730 to 1130 was work. And so I think they've made a lot of license plates there, which seems to be a big like job for prisons. Oh. Which is interesting. My brother would like that. He used to have a whole, when he was a teenager, one of his like full walls was just covered in different license plates.

Well, maybe some of them were made by men in Alcatraz. Perhaps. Perhaps. And then also like kitchen duties, laundry, all that stuff. 11.30 a.m. lunch, 12 to 4.30 more work, 4.30 dinner, 6.30 return to cells, lights out at 9.30. 4.30 dinner. I'd be so hungry by the time I went to bed. Same. You got to space that shit out. 4.30 dinner is so early. Yeah.

And then 1130 lunch. Yeah. It's all just like socks. Um, and you're just in your cell, like that much to do. Well, so talking, like we said, was banned outside of work and recreation times. And like the only, let me see. It's, it was something. Oh yeah. Okay. So inmates were guaranteed only four rights, food, clothing, shelter, and medical care, but everything else visits, recreation, reading, talking had to be earned by good behavior. Um,

So you came in being like, all you can do is like, you can have three meals a day and go to sleep and then you have to work. But then people did eventually like earn the rights to a lot of books. I think they were, I think they were actually given like 12 books when they came in. One of them being in the Bible, of course. Classic. Isn't that funny that the Bible is always in hotel rooms? Have we stopped that? We have stopped it, but I don't think because we stopped it.

We, Claire and I decided to put an end to this. We worked with legislation. Wouldn't that be crazy? I feel like it's only a matter of time before we're working with legislation on something. I know, until we're like in D.C. Yeah. Doing it big. I would love to wait like three more years. Yeah, let's wait until different administration. But yeah, because I think I checked last time I was in, oh, last time I was in Vegas staying at the Cosmo, I feel like I checked and there was one. Yeah.

That seems right. But at some other hotels I've stayed at, there's not. There wasn't one in your hotel in Napa for you to pray to get into French Laundry? There should have been so our prayers would have been answered. I know. If only you had a Bible, you could have pulled some verses and gone into French Laundry. God damn it. We really had to slum it then. Yeah. I don't think...

It's probably not necessary. Well, it's not necessary. You're right about that. It's not necessary. I think it would be illegal to force a hotel to do that. I know. I know. It's very odd. Actually, I would like to look into the history of how that came to be. I think that's actually very interesting. There's a story there. Everyone has a story. Everyone has a story to tell. But yeah, eventually you could gain the rights to musical instruments, and people did start playing those in the evening. I think Al Capone played the banjo.

That would haunt me in a way. 100%. Someone played the accordion. Can you imagine just like an empty cell and then all of a sudden you heard an accordion? Someone has like bagpipes. Like, oh God. Not that one. I can't imagine the accordion. That was like the sound of my childhood. And that's all I'm going to say. And that would be haunting. I used to have to listen to that half the time if you're catching my drift. I think all the Rammys are like, what? What?

But I do catch your drift. I just had no idea. See, again, I learned something new about you every time. It's so haunting. It's so haunting. The banjo would actually be haunting, though, too. Like the... I'd like a little, like, Spanish guitar if I were to choose something in, like, my... You know what I mean? Gorgeous. My Spanish guitar is so sexy. Like Vicky Cristina Barcelona, you know that scene when they're just, like, she's crying just listening to it? That'd be me. You're cracking me up. Yeah.

Yeah, well, hopefully someone earned the right to a Spanish guitar. But like we said, talking, you couldn't really do that. And they did also have solitary confinement in the hole. And these were pitch black, cold concrete cells. So this does eventually say you could have access to books, music, and movies, which I'm also like, it's the 30s, like what movies do you really have? Movies.

The talkies? The talkies, exactly. Some cells eventually had radios or musical instruments. Inmates could see, oh, this is torture. Inmates could see and hear the outside world, which was hard for them, especially New Year's Eve parties from the San Francisco shoreline, which made the isolation worse. Many inmates said the worst part wasn't the guards or the conditions. It was the loneliness. You could see the freedom across the water, but never reach it.

I actually feel sick to my stomach. Oh, my God. What was the loneliness like? What was it like? Oh, my. That makes me feel very upset. No, I know. To see if you guys are watching Tessa's reaction about the New Year's Eve parties. Because it's like it's already hard enough, you know, to not be invited or to just not be able to go. And then you're literally like having to...

Yeah. Hear it and see it. Yeah. And then hear, not only hear it and see it, hear joy. Oh my God. Like people counting down. Oh God. I know. I know. Really terrible. There's a famous quote that says, if you break the rules, you go to prison. If you break the prison rules, you go to Alcatraz. So yeah, they're like, we're going to torture you.

But who was in Alcatraz? Like, who were these people that had to suffer like this? Truly. Yeah. Well, let's talk about the most notorious inmates and then who tried to escape. Yeah. So I think, like, the most famous inmate I would say that I knew of was Al Capone. ♪

Thank you for listening to our preview of our Alcatraz episode. If you want to listen to the full hour and a half long episode ad-free, you can join our premium channel, which the link is in the show notes. When you are a premium Ramy, you get three bonus episodes a month, plus the whole back catalog of episodes. I think there's about 80 episodes on there. You also get added to our close friends list on Instagram, where you get to see hidden stories and

and post. It's just the most fun. So to listen to this full episode ad-free or the whole catalog of premium, join our premium channel and the show notes.