On this most recent trip to San Francisco for my very first WordCamp, my buddy Shad and i took the boat out to Alcatraz Island. Notice i just wrote a sentence that didn’t reference the Steadicam Merlin. Oh, the picture at right isn’t Alcatraz… it’s a snap from a WordPress/Theme/App incubator just down the street from where WordCamp was held.

I highly recommend the boat ride out to Alcatraz, but don’t do it like i did, evening boat, night coming on only moments after arriving on the island. And also don’t expect to be given free reign to wander. The island is basically a mess, largely in ruins. I sympathize with the National Park Service when they fence off what i consider some of the best parts. There are tripping hazards everywhere outside of the buildings, that more people aren’t injured by falls is surprising.

[slidepress gallery=’alcatraz-island’]

The audio tour is a well-produced narrative and worth doing once, but here is my problem: reenacting the past, dramatizing the events of the past, simply isn’t my cup of tea. Of course history fascinates me, but i’m more interested in what i can create from the events of history in my present. Does that make sense?

The facts of Alcatraz seem almost quaint by today’s standards: create a maximum security prison to incarcerate the worst of the worst. The great quote “Break the rules and you get sent to prison. Break the rules in prison, you get sent to Alcatraz” might have been intended to strike fear into the hearts of criminals, but today it seems more like a challenge issued by a naive criminal justice system.

The tales of the escape attempts are the best parts, the tale of the riot, “The Battle of Alcatraz,” and ensuing deaths at the hands of US Marines called in to put it down is chilling.

Alcatraz was in service as a Federal Prison for only 29 years when then Attorney General Robert Kennedy ordered the facility closed. The government then abandoned the island leaving most equipment in place. Later a band of native americans squatted on the island setting fire to some of the buildings. They, like most Indians, were forcibly removed from the land they’d claimed.