Episode 46: “Ain’t No Good For Nobody”: The Ghosts of Alcatraz Island

Today we are hopping on a ferry across San Francisco Bay to an island that has lived in the nightmares of the many prisoners who were once forced to exist there and which may still house the souls of those who were never able to leave. Today on The Odder, we are talking about Alcatraz Island. Its histories, its legends, and most important, its hauntings. So shimmy into your prison jumpsuit and get your raft to freedom ready and Let’s Go!

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Music Credit
"SCP-x2x (Unseen Presence)" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
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"Deadly Roulette" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
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"I Knew a Guy" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
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"Night on the Docks - Trumpet" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
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Main Theme:
"Dream Catcher" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
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Transcript

1. Hello and welcome to The Odder Podcast. I’m your host Madison Paige and today we are hopping on a ferry across San Francisco Bay to an island that has lived in the nightmares of the many prisoners who were once forced to exist there and which may still house the souls of those who were never able to leave. Today on The Odder, we are talking about Alcatraz Island. Its histories, its legends, and most important, its hauntings. So shimmy into your prison jumpsuit and get your raft to freedom ready and Let’s Go!
2. Hello my Odders, how is everyone doing today? Did we all enjoy last week's episode on Tom and Eileen Lundergan? Did it inspire any Thalassophobia in anybody? If you really enjoyed it or if you didn’t, please leave a rating and review, they really do help! For the returning listeners, welcome back, for the new listeners, welcome welcome to The Odder podcast where we are a trail mix of all things unknown, unsolved, and just plain odd. If you have an idea for an episode you think would be fun, good news! I do listener requests so if you want your own personalized episode, you can send me an email at theodderpod@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you and know what you want to hear from me! I will say that I do tend to shy away from the more popular topics so if that is something you guys are more interested in, you’ll have to let me know. If you are someone who's like “why haven’t you talked about Bundy? When are we getting a Dahmer episode?” if left up to my own devices, probably never so please please please let me know if there are topics or stuff that you would like more coverage on and as long as they fall within purview, I’m happy to do them for you. Well this is the last episode in February which has just been chock full of them and we are ending on a fun haunting filled episode on Alcatraz Island. A place I got to visit! That’s right, you know I love to do episodes where I can actually tell you guys if it’s actually worth the airfare to see! And every ghost show, history channel expose, urban explorer, or podcaster has an episode on Alcatraz because the place is just so damn menacing. Hosting criminals such as Al Capone and the real Machine Gun Kelly, the prison was also famous for the many elaborate escape attempts and even more famous for the amount of ghosts still said to haunt its foggy walkways and the desolate walls of the still standing cell block. Well let's not waste any more time before the guards make their next round and talk about Alcatraz. 
3. Frank Weatherman was the last convict to leave Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, otherwise called The Rock, on March 21st in 1963. His parting words for the place have become immortalized and seemed to reflect the history of the island which has never known a time of peace as long as people have insisted on living on it.
4. “This Rock ain’t no good for nobody.” 
5. Alcatraz Island is considered to be rather small and exists only 1.25 miles offshore of San Francisco, California. It was first documented by spanish naval officer and explorer Juan Manuel de Ayala in 1775. He actually named an adjoining island "La Isla de los Alcatraces' ' which translates roughly to the Island of the Pelicans. Today we know this island as Yerba Buena Island. However, when looking at Ayala’s 1775 chart of the San Francisco Bay, English Naval Officer and explorer Captain Frederick W. Beecey mistakenly applied the listing for “Isla de Alcatraces” to the wrong rock. It stuck however, and so Alcatraz Island stole the name. 
6. It turned out to be quite fitting because Alcatraz was known, even then, for the absolute surplus of birds that lived upon it.  In August 1827 French Captain Auguste Bernard Duhaut-Cilly wrote "... running past Alcatraze's Island ... covered with a countless number of these birds. A gun fired over the feathered legions caused them to fly up in a great cloud and with a noise like a hurricane."
7. Now as long as Alcatraz has existed, something about it has inspired people in power to feel a need to do something with it. The first person this job fell to was a man named Julian Workman who was given the island by Mexican governor Pio Pico in June 1846 with the express orders to build a lighthouse on it. 
8. However, not much later that same year, Military Governor of California John C Fremont would buy the island for $5000 in the name of the United States Government. 
9. Side note, California didn’t become a part of the United States till 1850. So San Francisco Bay and all its rocks technically belonged to the Mexican government at that time. 
10. In 1850, following the mexican-american war and this acquisition of CA, President Millard Fillmore, it’s ok I don’t remember him either, ordered the island be set aside specifically to use as a US military reservation. Oh, and also when Fremont came to the government and was like hey can you compensate me for buying you that island out of my own pocket, they invalidated the sale and refused to pay him anything. 
11. Lovely, aren't they?
12. So the island is being passed around more than a bottle of tums after a BBQ but not much is being done with it. Finally in 1853 under the eye of Zealous B. Tower, hell of a name, the United States Army corps of Engineers began to fortify the island in order to use it as a coastal battery to protect against any enemy approaches into the San Fran Bay. This would continue through until 1858 and end in the completion of the initial version of Fort Alcatraz and the arrival of 200 soldiers. 
13. The American Civil War broke out in 1861. In response, the island mounted 85 cannons and later increased this to 105 in 1866 around the perimeter. However, the small size of the garrison meant that only a few of these guns could be used at one time. Fort Alcatraz was instead utilized more as an arsenal to prevent firearms from falling into the hands of Confederate sympathizers. It was also used as a place to imprison these sympathizers and privateers. It never did fire all those guns on any enemies but it did build the first operational lighthouse on the West Coast of the United States during it’s time. 
14. It became clear that the isolation of the island made it an ideal place to keep those you didn’t want running off anywhere and it was developed into a military prison for the Department of the Pacific. Not only did it house Civil War POWs but in 1863, it also began holding private citizens that were accused of treason. New troops were also trained on the island and this reached its peak in 1865 with 433 men.
15. After the Civil War though, the island's defenses were considered obsolete and several plans including one to level the entire island and construct shell-proof underground magazines and tunnels, were undertaken between 1870 and 1876 but never completed.
16. In the end, it was decided to keep Alcatraz doing what it had always been proven to be good for, detention. 
17. Inmates had been previously housed in the basement of the guardhouse but in 1867 a brick jailhouse was built. Among those first incarcerated at Alcatraz were confederates caught in the West Coast and Hopi Native American Men in the 1870’s who refused orders to send their children away to the Indian boarding schools. 
18. In 1898, the prison population experienced its first boom from 26 inmates to 450 during the Spanish-American War. After the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, civilian prisoners were transferred to Alcatraz for safety and on March 21st, 1907 it was officially designated as the Western U.S. Military Prison. 
19. The increased pressure and number of inmates on the island prompted the 1909 construction of a huge concrete main cell block which remains on the island today. It was completed in 1912 and during World War 1, Alcatraz served as a place to hold conscientious objectors.
20. On October 12th, 1933, the barracks on Alcatraz were acquired by The US Department of Justice and the Island received its official status shift into a federal prison in August 1934. The remote little rock was deemed the perfect spot to hold prisoners who were known to be repeat trouble makers in other facilities. 137 prisoners arrived on the island at 9:40 am on August 11th of that year and served as the inaugural batch. They were made up of mostly notorious bank robbers and murderers. 
21. Along with the prisoners, a staff of 155 arrived to man the island. Now Alcatraz was known for its ability to hold a man, not rehabilitate them and it was a rough go staying on The Rock. During the 29 years, it operated as a federal penitentiary, it held some of the most notorious criminals to date including Al Capone, a famous gangster and crime boss, Robert Stroud, also called the Birdman of Alcatraz, who was a convicted murderer who raised and sold birds while on the island, George “Machine Gun” Kelly, a gangster nicknamed for his favorite weapon, and Ellsworth Raymond “Bumpy” Johnson, a Harlem crime boss. 
22. Life on Alcatraz was anything but comfortable. In fact most prisoners considered other penitentiaries to be an oasis compared to The Rock. The island is often surrounded by fog and wind so cold and damp that guards were seen wearing overcoats even in midsummer. 
23. In an article written by a man named Bryan Conway who served only two months there, he described the tense environment. Their days started at 6:00am with the first bell and prisoner counts were conducted every 30 minutes going forward. The food was complimented as being much better than usual prison fare with a breakfast of coffee, coffee cake, and cereal, a lunch of meat, beans, coffee, bread, celery and for supper, chili, tomatoes, and apples, with hot tea. Talking during meals was prohibited but some conversations were still managed by grumbling and whispers. 
24. Men in the prisons all had assigned tasks that they completed such as laundry or mechanical work. At the end of the day after they were finished with their assignments, they were walked through a device they called the snitch box which was basically a rudimentary metal detector. However, this device was not always reliable. Once it lit up on every man with nothing to show and another time it allowed two men with knives to pass through. 
25. After they were locked in their cells for the night, they were allowed time to read magazines and coveted news clippings until lights out. They were allowed to utilize this time to write one letter of less than two pages each week to a blood relative and in return they could receive a copy of a letter that had been mailed back after it had been read, reviewed, and censored by the main office. 
26. If a prisoner was lucky to have a visitor, this was also greatly restricted. They were not allowed to touch or even shake hands. They would view each other with a screen between them and conversation was held by shouting through a tube in the presence of two guards. 
27. Conway described that the reason Alcatraz was so feared by inmates was because of the severity of hopelessness and punishments experienced by them. The restriction of the routine and the isolation drove many men to their breaking point. Conway describes one incident where a convict working on the dock suddenly picked up an ax and chopped off every finger on one hand before begging a guard to do the same to his other and laughing the whole time. He stated that in his last year there, he saw 14 prisoners go violently insane.
28. Sleep deprivation was a major cause, as at night, guards would conduct target practice right outside the cell house utilizing human-like dummies who they then left sprawled along the walkway in warning to the convicts about what the guards were capable of. The noise of the shots kept many men from sleeping. 
29. Solitary confinement was the worst punishment of all. Located on the bottom row of D-Block, in the coldest area of the prison, these cells contained only a sink, toilet, and a low wattage bulb that could be turned off from outside by the guard. The mattress was removed during the day leaving those confined with no comfort and they were not allowed any time in the yard or showers during their stay. The worst of these cells was called the Oriental. Stripped naked, a man was herded into this specific cell which contained nothing but a hole in the ground for waste and left in complete darkness. While in there, they would be kept alive on a diet of bread and water. It was said that anyone kept in solitary confinement longer than the limit of 19 days was tempting death but many were kept in there for an extended stay. Men could be heard screaming and crying in the solitary cells and most did not leave unchanged.
30. Knowing these conditions, it was not a shock that many men attempted to escape. During its 29 years of operation, 36 prisoners made 14 escape attempts. Of these attempts, 23 were caught alive, six were shot and killed, two drowned, and five are listed as “missing and presumed drowned”. 
31. One of these attempts, nicknamed the Battle of Alcatraz, occured on May 2nd, 1946 led to the death of two officers and three escaping convicts as well as the later execution of two of the perpetrators involved. 
32. The most well known escape attempt was conducted by Frank Morris, John Anglin, and Clarence Anglin on June 11, 1962. The three men had fashioned paper mache heads and propped them into their beds before making a break for it through the hole they had carved in their walls. They utilized ventilation ducts and an unused utility corridor before successfully escaping the island via an inflatable raft. 
33. The fate of the three men is still a mystery as their bodies were never recovered. While it is technically possible to survive a swim across the San Francisco Bay, no official evidence has ever been found to support a failure or a success and it is generally accepted that the three men drowned. 
34. One man did make it to shore however. In 1962, John Paul Scott, a prisoner on Alcatraz, successfully survived the bay and made it to the shore of San Francisco. However, he was so exhausted that the police quickly found him unconscious and in hypothermic shock. This incident inspired what is now the annual Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon that includes a 1.5 miles swim from the island to the bay shore. 
35. Alcatraz Penitentiary would close in 1963. The reasoning for this would ultimately be blamed on economics. Alcatraz was surprisingly expensive to operate compared to other prisons. For instance, it costs them nearly $10 a day to care for each convict whereas at the Atlanta penitentiary, it cost merely $3. The buildings had been significantly damaged due to the salt water saturation and the paper mache head escape the previous year were all factors that did not help the decision. 
36. After the island was abandoned by the Prison System, it then saw occupation by Native American Activists beginning in March of 1964. During the nineteen months and nine days they protested on the island, the occupiers demanded changes to the Indian termination policy which was a series of laws aimed at assimilation Native Americans into what was considered by the government to be mainstream US society. Those that inhabited the island demanded that it be adapted into a place for Native American education, ecology, and cultural protection under the Treaty of Fort Laramie. This treaty from 1868 between the US and the Sioux promised to return all retired, abandoned, or out of use federal land to the native people.
37. Graffiti from this occupation remains on the building and is visible from the water when riding the Ferry in. 
38. The occupation ended on June 11, 1971 and did influence President Richard Nixon to rescind the Indian Termination policy established by earlier administrations. 
39. In 1972, The National Park Service purchased Alcatraz and Fort Mason from the US Army in order to establish the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. It remains under them to this day and now operates as a tourist attraction and museum. Alcatraz draws 1.7 million visitors annually who arrive to the island via ferry and are given the chance to freely explore the buildings, land, and museum on the property. 
40. As I stated in the beginning of this episode, I had the very exciting opportunity to be one of these visitors and of all the spots I hit up on my trip to San Francisco, I would highly, highly recommend going to Alcatraz. It was ridiculously fun and amazing. The island now functions as a bird sanctuary and you really do get free reign to explore on your own, at your own pace. The tour is self guided with a recorded system in which you listen to stories from real inmates and guards who were on the island. Honestly, a ten out of ten experience. 
41. But we aren't here to talk about my vacations or the history of islands or even the treacherous waters of the bay
42. What we’ve come to talk about today are the supposed ghosts that haunt the island. Because you can't have a place with a history as violent and bloody as Alcatraz without something being left behind. Many men either lost or took their lives on The Rock in despair or desperation. Soldiers, prisoners, guards. Alcatraz served as an excellent place to trap the living, why shouldn’t it also trap the dead. 
43. Alcatraz island was once stated to be “no good for nobody” and this seemed to be true even in its heyday. Both visitors and inmates have vanished from its stony presence and there is even one startling account of a group of inmates disappearing from their cells only to be found hours later, wandering the prison in a daze, disoriented and unsure where they were. 
44. Guards working on the island when it was still a functioning penitentiary often reported strange experiences. They would hear sobs and moans in empty cells, rotting smells without explanation, and even encounters with something they call “The Thing” which appeared to them in the shape of a man with glowing eyes. Sometimes they would report apparitions of dead prisoners or even soldiers who appeared before them before vanishing into thin air. 
45. Even the warden was not immune to the dead of Alcatraz. 
46. Warden Johnston, who was a staunch skeptic, was once leading several guests on a tour of the prison. Suddenly, he heard the sounds of a woman sobbing. The group traced the noises to the walls of the dungeon, an underground area below the prison. Suddenly the sobbing stopped and the group was assailed by an icy wind whose origin had no explanation. Later during a Christmas party at his home on the island, a man appeared before several guards in attendance. The man was wearing a gray suit, a hat with a brim, and had mutton chop style sideburns. The spooked guards could only gape at him as the room suddenly dropped to a frigid temperature and the fire in the stove went out. Seconds later, the man vanished as quickly as he had appeared. 
47. On more than one occasion, Guards were sent to the floor fearing a prison revolt when the sounds of cannon fire, guns, and violent screams filled the air around them. However, when they cautiously looked around for an explanation, every prisoner would be in their cell and none of them would have guns let alone cannons. Guards would also be confronted with billowing black smoke coming out of a deserted laundry room. Fearing that the prison was on fire, they would rush to put it out only to find that minutes later the room would be smoke free and there was no sign of there ever being anything aflame. Neither of these incidents could ever be explained. 
48. The cells are not the only place to have strange experiences tied to them, even the Islands Lighthouse is said to be haunted. James A. King, the island’s first lighthouse keeper was found dead under strange circumstances. It is said he still roams the structure and can be heard whistling an eerie tune. Sometimes a flashing green light will make its way slowly around the island from the lighthouse before vanishing into the fog. Many believe this is the old lighthouse keeper making one more round of checks.
49. The most haunted part of the prison was reported to be D-Block. While originally functioning similar to the other holding cells, it was later structured to be more secure after a 1939 escape attempt and became known as the “Treatment Unit”. 
50. In D-block, the most dangerous and ill behaved prisoners were kept and lived in virtual isolation. They were not allowed contact with the general population nor did they work or eat in the mess hall. The only time they left their cells were for a once a week visit to the rec yard and a twice weekly shower. To keep them from going completely mad, they were allowed reading material but this provided little comfort as their cells also faced the Golden Gate Bridge where the coldest air blew from. A guard working on the block was even known to turn on the air conditioning to make it even more cold and miserable for those who lived there. 
51. Solitary confinement or “The Hole” was also located on D-Block. In the 1940’s a guard reported seeing a man dressed in late 1800’s prison gear walking along the solitary confinement cells. This sighting would become an inside joke amongst the guards. 
52. One of the most infamous spots is supposedly the site of terrible violence. Cell 14D is a solitary confinement cell. An inmate who had been acting violent toward guards and other prisoners was punished by being placed inside. In the night, sudden screams came from inside the cell. Terrified cries from the man claiming an evil creature with glowing eyes was attacking him. The guards, believing he was trying to get out of solitary, ignored him. The cries continued well into the night before suddenly cutting off. The next morning, he was found dead in his cell with a terrified expression on his face and hand print bruising on his neck. Autopsy claims stated that the strangulation was not self-inflicted. It is said that his spirit continues to haunt the cell. Visitors claim to feel sudden drops of temperature inside the chamber, hear the sounds of chains or knocking on the walls, and some guards have even reported seeing a ghostly figure inside when the chamber is supposed to be empty. At the time of the convict's death, many believed a guard had killed him to shut him up but no one was accused. It was shortly after this, that the strangled convict made an appearance at roll call. Lining up to the horror of watching guards and prisoners alike before his ghostly apparition faded from view. 
53. To this day, some park rangers refuse to go to D-block or in Cell 14D alone.
54. Moving to C-Block, we come across a utility passageway utilized once in an escape attempt where three convicts lost their lives in 1946. Loud clanging noises are heard behind the closed door but when opened, the sounds stop and reveal nothing but empty space. However, when the investigation is done and the door is shut, the noises start back up again. Apparitions of a man wearing prison fatigues and the disembodied voices at the sight of the three prisoners' deaths are also reported. 
55. The laundry room on C-block is said to hold its own brand of boogeyman. This was actually investigated by CBS news utilizing celebrity psychic Sylvia Brown and ex-convict Leon Thomspon. Syvia claimed to have encountered a presence and felt the strong impression of violence in the laundry room. She described to Leon a tall man with a bald head and small beady eyes. Leon claimed this matched the description of a man named Abie Maldowitz, also called The Butcher. He was a hitman with Murder Incorporated before he got caught and sent to Alcatraz. He was murdered by another prisoner in the laundry room. This was later confirmed by prison records. 
56. In Cellblock B, the cell that Al Capone was held in is located at the outer west end. Over the years, visitors and rangers have reported hearing the sound of a banjo being strummed in the cell. Over all the cell blocks, Rangers have reported strange crashing noises, disembodied running footsteps, screams, cell doors that mysteriously slam on their own, unexplained moans, the sounds of chains rattling or draggings, and the overall feeling that you are not only not alone but are also being closely watched. 
57. Both the hospital ward and mess hall have reported sounds of screams and strange voices. 
58. Alcatraz Island is not only considered one of the most haunted places in the United States but also the world and has featured on TV episodes such as Ghost Adventures, The Dead Files, Ghost Hunters, and many more. It has inspired movies such as 1979’s Escape from Alcatraz which did very well and 2018’s Alcatraz which did very poorly. It has appeared on more podcasts, youtube channels, and bucket lists than can be counted. And there are dozens of books about it, including Alcatraz from Inside by Jim Quillen that my cousin picked up on our trip there and told me is actually very great. It is a travel experience not worth missing and I highly recommend you go, just know that should you visit while you are looking in the cells, something could very well be looking right back out at you. 
59.  Well, that’s all for this episode. So what do you think? Do you think Alcatraz is haunted? Do you think you could have escaped? Are you planning a visit? Let us know what you think on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram and leave a review. The Odder Pod is also on TikTok. Come follow us there! Have a suggestion for a show? Send me an email at theodderpod@gmail.com with your request and whether you’d like me to mention your name, your alias, or nothing at all. Remember this is The Odder Side so give me something cool, creepy, or confusing to deep dive for you. If you liked the show, leave us a review! They really help! Try not to end up in prison before the next episode. The Odder Podcast posts every other Thursday. Thanks for listening and I’ll see you next time on The Odder side.