Alcatraz: Rigid and Unusual Punishment  Oct 9, 2009 - by Michael
Esslinger - 0 Comments    During the 29 years Alcatraz operated
as a federal penitentiary it built a reputation as a Devil's
Island of the soul. If Al Capone was the nation's symbol of
lawlessness, then Alcatraz would be the nation's symbol for
punishing the lawless.  by Michael Esslinger  Alcatraz. The name
alone said it all. It was meant to send a shudder down the
spines of the nation's most incorrigible criminals, and it did
from the day it opened in 1934. It stripped Al Capone of his
power. It tamed "Machine Gun" Kelly into a model of decorum. It
took the birds away from the Birdman of Alcatraz.  Alcatraz was
the end of the line. It was the U.S. government's version of the
"final solution" to combating the lawlessness that Prohibition
spewed throughout the Roaring 20s and into the teeth of the
Great Depression. The government needed a prison as tough and
harsh as the high-profile criminals it was finally running to
ground. In Alcatraz, with