Incarcerated Writers Debate Education, Sentencing, and Institutional Authority in a Collection of "The Walls Tribune," from Washington State Penitentiary, 1969 to 1970

Washington State Penitentiary

Periodical

Washington State Penitentiary inmate newspaper archive from 1969 to 1970, documenting incarcerated writers’ participation in the first phase of Walla Walla’s experiment in penal reform and elected inmate representation. Nine issues combine editorials on sentencing, parole, education, employment, and institutional authority with prison news, council proceedings, creative writing, poetry, compound updates, recreation, and sports. They appeared as Superintendent Bobby J. Rhay implemented reforms ordered by Governor Daniel J. Evans and Director of Institutions William Conte, including the end of mail censorship, personal clothing, hearings for disciplinary infractions, and an elected inmate council with a formal voice in prison governance. Washington State Penitentiary received national attention for these policies, introduced within an institution long marked by overcrowding, restrictive confinement, riots, and public criticism of its conditions.

"The Walls Tribune." Walla Walla, Washington: Washington State Penitentiary, 1969 to 1970. Nine individually stapled issues, each approximately 15 to 17 pages, gathered by a removable metal clip; approximately 135 to 150 pages in total. Mastheads include August 1969, Volume 2, Issue 2; October 1969, Volume 2, Issue 4; December 1969, Volume 2, Issue 6; and two 1970 numbers identified as Volume 2, Issues 8 and 11. The masthead names Lauren Watson as editor, Ed Gray as associate editor, Don Frazier among the editorial staff, J. Rhay as superintendent, P. Macklin as associate superintendent of custody, A. Freeman as associate superintendent of classification and treatment, and R. Friedberg as staff advisor. Watson’s contributors move between institutional criticism and the daily work of building a prison community. Jim Bell’s “First Offender?” rejects the category through a darkly comic catalogue of childhood misbehavior ending in murder; Frank Roen’s “The Lions of Georgia” uses the capture, mutilation, and attempted domestication of wild animals as an allegory of confinement and imposed obedience. Vince Cunniff addresses the academic and vocational qualifications required for employment after release, while Ed Gray satirizes bribery, nepotism, and conflicts of interest through a fictitious corporation managed by figures named Graft, Bribery, and Payoff. Reports on the Inmate Advisory Council quote a parole board member describing the council as a real contribution to the institution, announce Vern Heidecker’s election as president of the Spearheaders, and describe the Impact group as a self help organization operated by inmates without direct supervision. “The Class of ’70” records one of the penitentiary’s largest graduating classes, naming recipients of school, vocational, community college, and training certificates. Jackie Moore’s account of the Inland Empire Amateur Athletic Union boxing tournament names Curtis Johnson, John “Candy Man” Thomas, Willie Ryals, Mickey Morris, Davey Linkem, and other Washington State Penitentiary boxers, while football reports preserve scores, player names, injuries, and contests against teams from Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution and the surrounding region. Articles on plumbing crews, machine repair, painting, Toastmasters, the prison canteen, Little League, parole, crime statistics, and Judge Bazelon’s declaration that prison does not work extend the record from formal policy to the labor, education, humor, and interpersonal organization of confinement.
Walla Walla had supported inmate journalism before The Walls Tribune: the Washington State Penitentiary published the monthly W.S.P. Outlook from approximately 1944 through 1955, establishing a longer institutional history of newspapers produced within the prison. Whitman College’s Washington State Penitentiary records describe the surviving publications as produced primarily by incarcerated people and document their experiences alongside administrative records, reports, photographs, and oral histories; the publications have since been digitized through the American Prison Newspapers project. These nine issues preserve the reform program at its point of implementation, before violence, administrative retrenchment, and changing correctional policies ended the experiment in the following decade. Moderate toning and handling wear; small tear to one front page; scattered annotations; staples intact; no substantial tearing. Overall good condition.

Item #23701

Price: $785.00