Century Old Prison--a Relic of Times Past, a Mausoleum of Wasted Lives

Parnall Correctional Facility, where I am currently housed, is a mishmash of old and newer structures. Little planning went into the logistics of the prison. Buildings were erected wherever there was room, so the flow is haphazard at best. Some of the housing units are "modern" pole barns. Others, like where I live, are multi-level buildings, constructed using a design that is more than a century old. 

When you walk into my housing unit, after passing the officers' station (an office), you walk onto what is called "base yard." Here, nine steel tables are bolted to the concrete floor, and benches face a TV at the end of the roughly 250 foot long corridor. Nearer the officers' station are steel countertops for "cooking" with four microwaves and two hot pots for water. 

On the same level are roughly 60 cells, mostly for prisoners who are unable to climb stairs on a regular basis. Just beyond the TV and benches are the showers, which offer minimal privacy. Beyond the showers is a doorway leading to the next housing unit, which is similarly constructed. Only officers and staff are allowed to use this door. 

Back on base, one can look up to see two rows of cells facing each other on each level. In between is an air space opened from the base level to the ceiling. Sadly, too many men over the years have chosen a brief dive to the base to end their suffering. In my short eight months here, so far, I've only seen it once--but even once is enough to cause one trauma. 

The floors rise five levels, from base to tier four through a series of stairs. The tiers above base have roughly 75 cells split between two sides (approx. 350 cells in all). Each cell is roughly ten feet long and six feet wide with bars on each end and concrete walls between each cell. 

Inside the cells is a metal bunk with a thin mat, a standing locker, a school sized desk, and a metal toilet and sink. Roughly twenty inches separates the bed and the desk, just enough to slide in a plastic chair. 

The construction of this prison housing unit is different than more modernly constructed prisons. The location of Parnall Correctional Facility, in Jackson, Michigan, is adjacent to Michigan's oldest prison--known as "behind the wall," or "The Big House." Though no longer housing prisoners, many of Jackson prison's buildings still stand, monuments to a bygone era and the thousands of lives who suffered there. The back wall of my housing unit abuts the yard of Jackson prison. 

The Big House was built in the 1830s, one of the early adopters of the Auburn system of total isolation. My housing unit was added several decades later, in the early 1900s. It has had various "upgrades" over the years, but the infrastructure is still quite old. It remains open, at least in part, because it is one of the few Michigan level one prisons offering single man cells. Some prisoners, mostly in the housing unit next door, require single man cells because of their gender identity or sexual orientation. Consequently, that unit is pejoratively called, "The Doll House." 

Modern prison designs, whether the "pole barns" found at this prison and in others around the state, or others like those seen on TV in other states, have made a drastic diversion from the old system of total isolation. In these other housing units, one is hard pressed to find a few minutes of solitude, or even a moment of silence. 

Even in my housing unit, where we enjoy the "luxury" of single man cells, the noise level is sometimes deafening. Many prisoners, including myself, use music we've purchased to tune out the noise. It's sometimes still not enough, even though we use ear buds. But one can enter his own cell and shut the barred door, providing a modicum of solitude. I'll take what I can get!

As I write this, it's count time, so the unit is relatively quiet. But once count clears, the noise level will rise precipitously. Men will rush to stand in the phone line (6 phones), to use an email kiosk (4 kiosks), to use a microwave (4 microwaves) or to grab one of the nine tables, all available for 350 prisoners. The old Jackson prison might have been called "the Big House," but as I look around all I see is a madhouse.