Sing Sing Prison is one of the most known prisons in America, along with a very important prison in history. Sing Sing was built in 1825 on the Hudson river. The notorious maximum-security prison encompasses much of this country’s vivid and violent history. A lot of the people Isaac T. Hopper interviewed in his diary were from Sing Sing or had previously served time in Sing Sing being convicted for a copious amount of offenses. Although most of the people Isaac talked to had minor offenses like larceny or burglary, Sing Sing also housed some of the most wanted criminals in the world. The life of a prisoner in Sing Sing was very structured. According to Morris’ chapter titled Inside the Walls, he talks about a day in the life of a prisoner.

Each morning they were woken up at 6 and had 30 minutes to get dressed and be ready for their morning count. When being released from their prison cells they would march in a military like fashion to dump their waste and go to breakfast. Breakfast was at 7:00, followed by work at 8:00. Lunch was at 12:00 and then it would be back to work for the prisoners until 4:00 when it was dinner time. After dinner they were free to roam the prison yard doing whatever they wanted. Once the whistle blew again it was back in their cells for the night (Morris, 267-268).

Sing Sing at this point and time run more like something to do with the military rather than being punished for the crimes they had committed. Most of the men in the prison now were old enough to remember the time when “there were years of dreaded lockstep, striped uniforms, and regimen of silence”(Morris, 268). At least as the years went on the conditions of Sing Sing only improved as a whole.

Sing Sing was the most important prison to be in the nineteenth century and began mimpicking Auburn for how it was run. Sing Sing is still around today, and continues to be an important part of history for the prison system of America. 

Sources: 

Brian, Denis. The Inside Story of a Notorious Prison Sing Sing. Ed. Linda Regan.(New York: Prometheus Books: 2005), 1-223.

Morris, James McGrath. “Inside the Walls.” In A true Tale of Life, Murder, and Redemption in the Age of Yellow Journalism, (New York: Fordham University, 2003), 264-273.