The Struggle to Build the Territorial Penitentiary
A desperate plea from the prison board for funding to build essential living quarters, highlighting the dire state of the Washington Territorial Penitentiary in 1887.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
It has been practically determined that first-rate brick can be made by the convicts on the penitentiary grounds, which can be used in the construction of the permanent buildings, so they will not cost as much as they otherwise would. As there is no suitable structure for the habitations and cells of the inmates, the Board decided to recommend the Legislature to authorize the building of a part of a ward. The absence of suitable habitations is absolute. Workshops, sentries, guardhouses, and storehouses are absolutely necessary.
“The absence of suitable habitations is absolute. Workshops, sentries, guardhouses, and storehouses are absolutely necessary.”
This 1887 report on the Washington Territorial Penitentiary reflects an early iteration of the state's perpetual cycle of debating prison infrastructure, labor-based convict manufacturing, and the state's responsibility for the humane 'habitation' of the incarcerated—a conversation that remains central to Washington's carceral policy today.
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