Looming large...
Our audio tour started here. With your selection of language on the headphones, you were walked around the entire place, listening to stories about prisoners, films, wardens etc. It was brilliantly made and together with the slideshow at the pier it gave a lot of detail to the Alcatraz history.
Oh no, Clint Eastwood's gone!
Great view, at least...
But did you all know this? After the prison was closed (think it was 1963), the island was "hijacked" by native Americans - of many tribes - who felt it only appropriate that the first place you meet on the West coast was Indian land. Besides, the island had no water, electricity or sewers, pretty much like the reservations they were being sent to at that time.
They were all thrown out. But returned, a few years later, and occupied it (pardon my memory, but I think) for 15 months - which made the President issue an official apology for the genocide on native Americans, and instating a law giving them the right to be their own people and not having to be Americans... So - a historic victory on Alcatraz! With all I read about the different tribes in my time - I really had no idea...
3 comments:
What beautiful, beautiful photos! Also for the last post! So, you've now posted on two of the four cities I've lived in...next stop Copenhagen? :-)
Poor native-americans :(
Some people dont have luck at all.
Wouldn't want to have been there in the past...but now it's a nice experience ;)
Fun to see your photos -- keep 'em coming! But you simply mustn't say "the Alcatraz" nor "the SFO." The "the" sounds dreadful in both cases.
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