disaster." The prison shopkeeper, who trusted the Younger's, released them and handed a revolver to Cole, an axe handle to Jim and a small iron bar to Bob.
According to a quote attributed to Cole, "We stood guard over the women prisoners, marched them from the danger of fire, and the prison authorities were kind enough to say that if it had not been for us there might have been tremendous loss of life."
The next day the prison was flooded with telegrams, and newspaper headlines that read such things as, "Did the Younger's escape?" and "Plot to free the Younger's." The warden suggested to his chief deputy that the Younger's be put in irons, not because he feared them, but to soothe the public. The deputy refused. Instead he took the Younger's to the county jail downtown, where they stayed three to four weeks. It was the only time they were outside the prison from 1876 to 1901.
Cole Younger recorded, "I can say without fear of contradiction that had it been in our minds to do so, we could have escaped from prison that night, but we had determined to pay the penalty, and if we were ever to return to liberty, it would be with the consent and approval of the authorities and the public."
Governor Hubbard worked on finding cell space for the prisoners by telegraphing county jails and the Wisconsin State Prison in Waupun. Most inmates were transferred by train. A few were housed temporarily on the prison grounds.
A matron and six female inmates were guests of the warden and his wife at their home adjacent to the prison before being taken to Winona. Three of them were doing time for murder.
As soon as they could put a roof on the burnt prison, the prisoners were brought back.
Most reconstruction was completed by the middle of 1886. There were now 582 cells and work space with machinery to employ over five hundred people. At the time there were only 387 prisoners.
On July 11, 1887, fifteen inmates put up $200 to start a prison paper. Three of the fifteen were the Younger brothers. Cole and James each gave $20 and Bob gave $10.
On August 10, 1887, the first edition of "The Prison Mirror" was published at the old Minnesota State Prison in Stillwater. It is the oldest continuously published prison newspaper in the country.
Cole Younger was a printer's assistant, called a "printer devil" back in those days.
In 1885, the legislature began the process of creating the Minnesota State Reformatory for Men. St. Cloud was chosen due to the granite quarry there that could be used to build the facility. The purpose was to be for correcting "criminal tendencies before they became chronic". It was felt that a younger prisoner could not be reformed by locking him up with the hardened criminals at Stillwater. In 1889, inmates began being transferred from Stillwater to St. Cloud.
In 1916, construction began at the St. Cloud site on the largest enclosed granite wall in the world. It is over one mile long, 22 feet high, and four and one-half feet thick. It was constructed from granite quarried within the prison grounds. This wall transformed the reformatory into the prison where all convicted felons first enter. Here they are evaluated. Some stay here while most get transferred to other Minnesota Correctional facilities.
Between 1858 and 1889 the cell capacity at Stillwater grew from 22 cells to 582.
In 1892, the forerunner of the parole system began. This allowed prisoners considered to be good risks to be released from prison before their sentence expired.
The twine factory banged out one million pounds of twine this year.
In 1893, a new parole law was passed by the legislature authorizing release of prisoners on parole prior to the expiration of their sentence.
There were three different classes of prisoners, each with its own uniform and its own set of rules and privileges.
Prisoners could be leased out to do work for others up until 1895. After that, only the sale of finished goods from the prison shops was permitted.
Inmates convicted to life sentences had not been allowed to be paroled. In 1901, the law was amended to allow lifers to be eligible for parole. This is when Jim and Cole Younger were paroled.
If you want Minnesota to have the death penalty, it's not going to happen. That is the fault of the Ramsey County Sheriff's Department. In 1906, they failed to properly hang murderer William Williams. There must not have been a budget crunch that year, because they used some extra rope on this guy. When the trap door was dropped and he fell through expecting to be hung, it did not happen, being hung that is. His feet touched the ground. No, it was not a divine intervention. The idiot that determined the length of the rope must have been bad at math. The three wizard deputies that were standing on the scaffolding were quick to find a solution. They pulled up on the rope and held him there thrashing around. It took fourteen and a half minutes before he stopped moving. Strangulation was not considered a proper way to be executed. Having one's body weight plop down at the end of the rope is a main ingredient in helping to help snap the neck and spinal cord. This was considered the humane way to kill. This hanging was like watching the end of a basketball game where one team keeps intentionally fouling the team that is leading and getting further behind. It seems to go on forever when you want it to end. You keep watching because you want to see how long it will take before the stupidity ends. The spectators expected a quick show and instead wound up with a marathon. I don't know if they were upset with all of the wiggling around or if they had other plans, but they were upset. Newspapers that printed this fiasco generated the public to put pressure on the legislature to end death sentences. This change took five years to execute no more executions. Before this change passed, however, they took a shot at consistency. They thought about performing all hangings at Stillwater prison. The thought was probably that one group of officers could dispose of prisoners more efficiently than various hacks across the state. I worked with plenty of officers that would have liked to have been on a death squad like that.
(While going through the academy and working in the prison I heard this story many times. Only the version being told was that the sheriff grabbed the rope and started dragging the guy around the grounds until he died. This is an example of how the truth gets distorted over time.)
As time passed, the state needed a larger prison to accommodate their increasing number of felons. They chose a location two miles south of the Battle Hollow location in South Stillwater. They secured 160 acres on a bluff overlooking the St. Croix River. This location also solved the problem of water flowing from the surrounding area into the prison.
The prison didn't open officially until 1914; however some prisoners were transferred there in 1909 to work in the twine factory.
The powerhouse, water tower and industry buildings were the first to be built. The prisoners lived on the third floor of the south industry building in a dormitory. They went to work on the first floor in the twine factory. Making twine was a staple of the prison industries program from early on at the first prison until a few decades ago when the demand for twine diminished.
In 1914, the new larger prison in South Stillwater officially opened to replace the prison in Stillwater. With the construction costs, the state was able to direct funds toward education and recreation activities for the inmates. This Minnesota prison was a model for countries around the world to come to see. The same thing happened when Minnesota built the Oak Park Heights Super Max Prison 68 years later.
In 1920, the Minnesota State Reformatory for Women was opened for business. The female prisoners housed in Stillwater entered their new homes in Shakopee.
With the new prison on line, the state expanded its prison industries program. In 1921, all of the prison industries became known as the Industrial Department. They produced twine, rope, barrels, shoes, farm machinery and other farm equipment. The prison industries program is now called MINNCOR. They have recently phased out of producing most of the farm machinery, however they will produce whatever they can get a contract for. While I was working there around 2006, they received a contract to assemble tractors.
On September 26, 1922, South Stillwater became a separate city from Stillwater. They changed the name of their new city to Bayport. That is how Stillwater Prison wound up in a town called Bayport.