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Alcatraz escape remains a mystery 55 years on


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I think this is a story that will continue to captivate yet remain a mystery because it doesn't appear to me as though there will ever exist definitive proof as to whether they survived.

Of course, I've considered that it was possible, but I don't believe they did. 

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I agree, we will never know.   I can't think of a reason why they would come forward.

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One thing about it. Whether they escaped or died trying they evidently didn't cause any further problems. In some ways being a famous escaped felon is almost as restrictive as being in prison unless you want to be caught and sent back and locked up tight forever. Very few common criminals have the sort of self-restraint that it would take to lay low forever and never contact their families or anyone.

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Like the D. B. Cooper case, this one is always intriguing. 

This documentary may have been discussed here before:

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2015/10/13/photograph-christmas-cards-proves-1962-alcatraz-escapees-survived-family-says/

"That friend claims the Anglin brothers told him they body surfed behind a ferry leaving Alcatraz before being picked up by an accomplice boat. It’s currently one of the most popular theories supporting their escape to freedom after digging out of their cells with spoons."

Edited by simplybill
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I did the Alcatraz tour about 20 years ago. Really fascinating! They even had one of the former COs there to field questions afterward.

Alcatraz would've been a bad place to be incarcerated. The cells weren't heated, and that San Francisco fog can get pretty chilly in the wintertime. 

 

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1 hour ago, DanL said:

Very few common criminals have the sort of self-restraint that it would take to lay low forever and never contact their families or anyone.

Like the notorious mob enforcer, Sammy 'The Bull' Gravano, who testified against the Mafia and went into the Witness Protection Program, and then got busted for selling drugs a few years later.

I may have to re-watch My Blue Heaven:

http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi2856688665/

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18 hours ago, simplybill said:

I did the Alcatraz tour about 20 years ago. Really fascinating! They even had one of the former COs there to field questions afterward.

Alcatraz would've been a bad place to be incarcerated. The cells weren't heated, and that San Francisco fog can get pretty chilly in the wintertime. 

 

That place sounds like a real life hell hole and a hell interesting tour? Did you get answers to your questions?

Underdogs inspire me. I like to believe he made it....

 

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3 hours ago, taniwha said:

That place sounds like a real life hell hole and a hell interesting tour? Did you get answers to your questions?

 

I didn't really have any questions after the tour, but my stepmom took a picture with the CO, who was a handsome Native American man. She was quite smitten.

I just now read a couple of articles about the place. Alcatraz may not have been too bad, compared to modern-day Supermax prisons:

10. Inmates requested transfers to Alcatraz. 
While Alcatraz was certainly not Club Med, its tough-as-nails reputation was a bit of a Hollywood creation. The prison’s one-man-per-cell policy appealed to some inmates because it made them less vulnerable to attack by fellow jailbirds. Alcatraz’s first warden, James A. Johnston, knew poor food was often the cause of prison riots, so he prided himself on serving good food, and inmates could return for as many helpings as they wanted. Inmates who behaved had access to privileges including monthly movies and a library with 15,000 books and 75 popular magazine subscriptions. Overall, some prisoners considered the conditions inside Alcatraz to be more attractive than at other federal prisons, and several asked to be moved there.

Interesting article:

http://www.history.com/news/10-things-you-may-not-know-about-alcatraz

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On ‎6‎/‎13‎/‎2017 at 4:10 AM, taniwha said:

That place sounds like a real life hell hole and a hell interesting tour? Did you get answers to your questions?

Underdogs inspire me. I like to believe he made it....

 

I took the tour as well about 20 years ago.  The place is a hell hole.  I really don't see how anyone could have made off there alive or in one piece.  Of course the seals that sun bath in the harbor could have helped them.  Who knows.

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I didn't know about this:

"Only 2,000 superb athletes, chosen in a lottery the previous October each year, are allowed to brave freezing waters, twisting roads and rocky paths to brag that they were able to swim to safety where the U.S. Government’s Federal Prison system thought no one could ever survive… let alone doing so right before riding a bike on San Francisco’s hills and running a foot race."

http://www.oursausalito.com/alcatraz/escape-from-alcatraz-triathlon.html

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