fun facts about louisiana state penitentiary nicknamed angola or "alcatraz of the south" or "the farm":*largest maximum security prison in the country (5000 offenders, 1800 officers)
*18,000 acres property including death row chamber (larger than manhattan)
*"Angola was designed to be as self-sufficient as possible; it functioned as a miniature community with a canning factory, a dairy, a mail system, a small ranch, repair shops, and a sugar mill. Prisoners raised food staples and cash crops. The self sufficiency was enacted so taxpayers would spend less money and so politicians such as Governor of Louisiana Huey P. Long would have an improved public image. In the 1930s prisoners worked from dawn until dusk"
"you've got to keep the inmates working all day so they're tired at night." -warden burl cain
warden burl cain - seems like a nice guy-source Wikipedia
anyway the rodeo starts @ 2 and its 2.5 hours north of new orleans. so jill and i thought we could drive to baton rouge, watch our respective football games at the bar and arrive a hour late to the rodeo. any rodeo ive ever been to is like a baseball game, you can casually observe and drink, apparently this is my first prison rodeo. its exactly 2hours - no exceptions.
this is what we missed... i guess
convict poker- only rule: last man sitting wins http://www.vincentmaling.com/wordpress/?p=6
convict poker http://www.newlywedinneworleans.com/2010/10/angola-prison-rodeo.htmlother events: wild cow milking, barrel racing, bust out, bull dogging, and guts and glory; where a poker chip is tied between the meanest brahma's horns and the object is the snatch it off.
the inmates also make crafts that are sold to the throngs of visitors. much of it looked like my middle school shop class work; endtables with 2" of bubbly lacquer and wobbly 3 legged chairs. also a fair number of lsu tigers and overly dramatic portraits of jesus on velvet (sometimes in the same scene).
what made it more interesting than my normal sunday trip to the arts and craft store was that the shopping was done under the watchful glaze of very scary prisoners behind chain-link fences. see below. i actually saw one with a real life eye patch. they are hanging against the fence just breathing and moaning like you would imagine.
i didnt like these but i wanted to get photos of the inmates in the background, but they would kill me if they saw me taking pictures.
this guy is named harlowe parker, a truly gifted artist from new orleans that produces these stylized paintings depicting rural louisiana life. they look similar to some art we saw in tanzania, the bodies elongated and exaggerated faces and limbs. apparently he has quite an audience including harry conick jr.
i think my shadow adds to the piece.
the beautiful landscape belies the tragic lives being lived behind those walls
