Alcatraz Tours

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 13:12:00 +0000

Alcatraz Tours

Park rangers conduct tours by recounting the prison's thrilling history along with intriguing anecdotes about Al Capone and other legendary figures that made a
"home" here.

http://www.nps.gov/alcatraz/

Address: Alcatraz Landing, Pier 33
Embarcadero San Francisco, CA 94133

Tel: 415-981-7625

Review from a customer:

I’m not a history buff and had chosen not to tour Alcatraz on previous visits to San Francisco. But I finally relented on this trip, and I’m glad I did. It was a fascinating glimpse into this chapter of history.

Be sure to purchase your tickets online prior to your trip. Apparently they frequently sell out, making it nearly impossible to purchase tickets on the day you want to tour. The boats to Alcatraz carry a surprisingly big crowd of people, so it’s best to purchase tickets on the first tour of the day. No one else will be on the island when your boat arrives. As the day progresses, it appears that the crowds can get quite large.

It’s also worth noting that the cruises depart from Pier 33. That’s about halfway between Fisherman’s Wharf and the Ferry Terminal Building, along the Embarcadero. You can easily walk from Fisherman’s Wharf or the Ferry Terminal Building, but it will take you a few minutes. The closest public transportation is the F Line streetcars, which stop right outside.

The boat ride takes about 10-15 minutes. Upon arrival at the island, there’s a brief talk from a ranger – basically laying down some ground rules for everyone. Then you’re free to climb the LONG hill up to the cell house. You can pop into the theater rooms for a brief video about Alcatraz, presented in multiple languages for non-English speaking guests.

Most of the tour takes place in the cell house. After arriving there, you’re given a headset with a pre-recorded tour in your language. After climbing one more flight of stairs, you’re instructed when to start your audio tour. The audio tour was way cooler than we expected. It’s professionally recorded and presented from the standpoint of some of the inmates and guards who worked at the prison. Following their prompts, you’re directed on a self-guided tour throughout all areas of the cell house. It’s a comfortable pace. You can pause your tour at any time if you want more time for exploring. The audio tour does an amazing job of bringing to life the stories from Alcatraz.

Following the audio tour, your free to explore other parts of the island. The buildings are old and somewhat creepy, but I found the architecture and atmosphere to be fascinating. Bring a jacket – it can get cool out on the island. It was raining the day we were there, so we didn’t get to explore much outside.

There is a large gift shop and book store at the end of the tour. And another opportunity to make purchases after you walk back down the hill toward the dock.

We spent about two hours on the island and will probably return for a future visit, hopefully when the weather is nicer.

Alcatraz Night Tour

Experience the many moods of Alcatraz with an evening visit to the Island. Enjoy the beauty of a sunset silhouetting the Golden Gate Bridge. Learn compelling stories about the Island's history and residents. Get spectacular 360-degree views of the whole Bay Area lit up at night... and feel a chill run down your spine as you venture into dark corners of the old island prison.

The Alcatraz Night Tour is a unique program limited to just a few hundred visitors per evening that includes special programs, tours and activities not offered during the day. See a list of sample programs to the right. The Night Tour was selected "Best Tour of the Bay Area" by San Francisco Magazine and has also been highlighted by the Los Angeles Times, Family Fun Magazine, Coastal Living, San Francisco radio station KFOG, the television show "Bay Area Backroads," and a variety of other media outlets. Read one of the reviews to the right.

The Alcatraz Night Tour operates year-round, Thursday-Monday evenings. The evening includes roundtrip ferry transportation, a live boat narration, a guided tour from Dock to Cellhouse, the Cellhouse Audio Tour, a keepsake souvenir brochure, recreation use fee, and a variety of special programs and presentations offered only at night. To purchase tickets call (415) 981-7625.

Proceeds from the Alcatraz Night Tour support preservation and restoration projects on Alcatraz and throughout the Golden Gate National Parks. For general Night Tour information, please call (415) 561-4926. Attention, this is not the ticket reservation line!

San Francisco

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 12:51:00 +0000

San Francisco is a popular international tourist destination, renowned for its chilly summer fog, steep rolling hills, eclectic mix of Victorian and modern architecture and its famous landmarks, including
the Golden Gate Bridge, cable cars, and Chinatown. The city is also a principal banking and finance center, and the home to more than 30 international financial institutions, helping to make San Francisco eighteenth place in the world's top producing cities, ninth in the United States, and fifteenth place in the top twenty Global Financial Centers.

San Francisco is located on the West Coast of the United States at the tip of the San Francisco Peninsula and includes significant stretches of the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay within its boundaries. Several islands - Alcatraz, Treasure Island, and the adjacent Yerba Buena Island, and a small portion of Alameda Island, Red Rock Island, and Angel Island are part of the city. Also included are the uninhabited Farallon Islands, 27 miles (43 km) offshore in the Pacific Ocean. The mainland within the city limits roughly forms a "seven-by-seven-mile square," a common local colloquialism referring to the city's shape, though its total area, including water, is nearly 232 square miles.

San Francisco is famous for its hills. There are more than 50 hills within city limits. Some neighborhoods are named after the hill on which they are situated, including Nob Hill, Pacific Heights, and Russian Hill. Near the geographic center of the city, southwest of the downtown area, are a series of less densely populated hills. Twin Peaks, a pair of hills resting at one of the city's highest points, forms a popular overlook spot. San Francisco's tallest hill, Mount Davidson, is 925 feet (282 m) high and is capped with a 103 foot (31 m) tall cross built in 1934. Dominating this area is Sutro Tower, a large red and white radio and television transmission tower.

Tourism is the backbone of the San Francisco economy. Its frequent portrayal in music, film, and popular culture has made the city and its landmarks recognizable worldwide. It is the city where Tony Bennett "left his heart," where the Birdman of Alcatraz spent many of his final years, and where Rice-a-Roni was said to be the favorite treat. San Francisco attracts the third-highest number of foreign tourists of any city in the U.S. and claims Pier 39 near Fisherman's Wharf as the third-most popular tourist attraction in the nation. More than 16 million visitors arrived in San Francisco in 2007, injecting nearly $8.2 billion into the economy—both all-time high figures for the city. With a large hotel infrastructure and a world-class convention facility in the Moscone Center, San Francisco is also among the top-ten North American destinations for conventions and conferences

Alcatraz - Escape From Alcatraz (1979)

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 12:39:00 +0000

Escape from Alcatraz is a 1979 American thriller film, directed by Don Siegel and starring Clint Eastwood. It dramatizes maybe the only successful escape from the maximum security prison on Alcatraz
Island. The film co-stars Fred Ward, and also features Patrick McGoohan as the suspicious, vindictive warden, and features the film debut of Danny Glover. Frank Morris and brothers John and Clarence Anglin have the distinction of being possibly the only people to ever escape from the Alcatraz prison. The three experience difficulties of prison life and decide to escape. The three inmates dig through the walls of their cells with spoons, make papier-mache dummies as decoys, and construct a raft out of raincoats to escape across San Francisco Bay, never to be seen again. There is some hint at the end of the film that the escape was successful, but in fact it remains a mystery as to whether the escapees succeeded or not.

Screenwriter Richard Tuggle spent six months researching and writing a screenplay based on the 1963 non-fiction account by J. Campbell Bruce. He went to the Writers Guild and received a list of literary agents who would accept unsolicited manuscripts. He submitted a copy to each, and also to anybody else in the business that he could cajole into reading it. Everyone rejected it, saying it had poor dialogue and characters, lacked a love interest, and that the public was not interested in prison stories. Tuggle decided to bypass producers and executives and deal directly with filmmakers. He called the agent for director Don Siegel and lied, saying he had met Siegel at a party and the director had expressed interest in reading his script. The agent forwarded the script to Siegel, who read it, liked it, and passed it on to Clint Eastwood. Eastwood was drawn to the role as ringleader Frank Morris and agreed to star, providing Siegel direct under the Malpaso banner. However, Siegel insisted that it be a Don Siegel film and out-maneuvered Clint by purchasing the rights to the film for $100,000. This created a rift between the two friends. Although Siegel eventually agreed for it to be a Malpaso-Siegel production, Siegel went to Paramount Pictures, a rival studio, and never directed an Eastwood picture again.

Escape from Alcatraz was well received by critics and is considered by many as one of the best films of 1979.Frank Rich of Time described the film as "cool, cinematic grace", while Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic called it "crystalline cinema". It currently holds a 94% "Fresh" rating on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes.The film grossed $5,306,354 in the U.S. during its opening weekend from June 24, 1979, shown on 815 screens. In total, the film earned $43,000,000 in U.S. theaters.

Alcatraz - Birdman of Alcatraz

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 11:32:00 +0000

Robert Franklin Stroud (January 28, 1890 – November 21, 1963), known as the

"Birdman of Alcatraz", was a federal American prisoner who reared and sold birds and became an ornithologist. Despite his nickname
, he actually only kept birds at Leavenworth penitentiary, prior to being transferred to Alcatraz, where he was not allowed to keep pets. Robert Stroud had moved to Alaska and begun a relationship with a cabaret dancer named Kitty O'Brien. According to Stroud, on January 18, 1909, while he was away at work, an acquaintance of theirs, F. K. "Charlie" Von Dahmer, viciously beat O'Brien. After finding out about the incident that night, Stroud confronted Von Dahmer and a struggle ensued, resulting in the latter's death from a gunshot wound. Stroud went to the police station and turned himself and the gun in. However, according to police reports, Stroud had knocked Von Dahmer unconscious, then shot him at point blank range. Although Stroud's mother Elizabeth retained a lawyer for her son, he was convicted of manslaughter on August 23, 1909 and sentenced to 12 years in the federal penitentiary on Puget Sound's McNeil Island.

While at McNeil Island, Stroud assaulted a hospital orderly who had reported him to the administration for attempting to obtain morphine through threats and intimidation, and also reportedly stabbed a fellow inmate who was involved in the attempt to smuggle the narcotics. On September 5, 1912, Stroud was sentenced to an additional six months for the attacks and transferred from McNeil Island to the federal penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas. While there, Stroud was reprimanded by a guard in the cafeteria for a minor rule violation. Although the infraction was not a serious one, it could have annulled Stroud's visitation privilege to meet his younger brother, whom he had not seen in eight years. Stroud stabbed and killed a guard, Andrew F. Turner, on March 26, 1916. He was sentenced to execution by hanging on May 27, and was ordered to await his death sentence in solitary confinement. The trial was later invalidated and in a later trial he was given a life sentence. That trial also was invalidated after reaching the U.S. Supreme Court,which ordered a new trial set for May 1918. On June 28 he was again sentenced to death by hanging. The Supreme Court intervened, but only to uphold the death sentence, which was scheduled to be carried out on April 23, 1920.

At this point Stroud's mother appealed to President Woodrow Wilson and his wife, Edith Bolling Wilson, and the execution was halted. Stroud's sentence was again commuted to life imprisonment. Leavenworth's warden, T. W. Morgan, did not approve of the decision, and ordered that Stroud was to be held in segregation for the complete duration of his imprisonment. Stroud was transferred to Alcatraz on December 19, 1942, where he spent six years in segregation and another 11 confined to the hospital wing. In 1959 Stroud was transferred to the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri, where he stayed until his death in 1963.

While at Leavenworth, Stroud found injured sparrows in the prison yard and kept them. He started to occupy his time raising and caring for his birds, soon switching from sparrows to canaries, which he could sell for supplies and to help support his mother. Soon thereafter, Leavenworth’s administration changed and the prison was then directed by a new warden. Impressed with the possibility of presenting Leavenworth as a progressive rehabilitation penitentiary, the new warden furnished Stroud with cages, chemicals, and stationery to conduct his ornithological activities. Visitors were shown Stroud's aviary and many purchased his canaries. Over the years, he raised nearly 300 canaries in his cells and wrote two books, Diseases of Canaries, and a later edition, Stroud's Digest on the Diseases of Birds, with updated specific information. He made several important contributions to avian pathology, most notably a cure for the hemorrhagic septicemia family of diseases. He gained respect and also some level of sympathy in the bird-loving field.

Alcatraz - Inmates - George "Machine Gun" Kelly

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 11:22:00 +0000

George Kelly Barnes (July 18, 1895 - July 18, 1954), better known as "Machine Gun Kelly", was a notorious American criminal during the prohibition era. Kelly's nickname came from his favorite
weapon, a Thompson submachine gun. His most famous crime was the kidnapping of oil tycoon & businessman Charles Urschel in July 1933 for which he, and his gang, earned $200,000 in ransom. The FBI investigation eventually led to Kelly's arrest in Memphis, Tennessee on September 26, 1933. His crimes also included bootlegging and armed robbery.

As he lived in the Prohibition era of the 1920s and 30s, George was able to find work as a bootlegger for himself as well as a colleague. After a short time, and several run-ins with the local Memphis police, he decided to leave town and head west with a new girlfriend.

To protect his family and escape law enforcement officers, he changed his name to George R. Kelly. He continued to commit smaller crimes and bootlegging. He was arrested in Tulsa, Oklahoma, for smuggling liquor onto an Indian Reservation in 1928 and sentenced for three years to Leavenworth Penitentiary, Kansas. Sent to Leavenworth on February 11, 1928, he was a model inmate and was released early.

Shortly thereafter, Kelly married Katherine Thorne, who purchased Kelly’s first machine gun and went to great lengths to familiarize his name in the underground crime circles. Some historians claim that Katherine even went so far as to plot some small bank robberies.

Nonetheless, Kelly’s last criminal activity proved disastrous when he kidnapped a wealthy Oklahoma City resident, Charles F. Urschel and his friend Walter R. Jarrett. Urschel, having been blindfolded, made sure to foil his kidnappers by noting all possible evidence of his experience such as background sounds, counting footsteps and leaving fingerprints on every surface in reach. This in turn proved invaluable for the FBI in their investigation, as they learned that Urschel had been held in Paradise, Texas Momento to residents is the area Kelly Gym.
Machine Gun Kelly's hideout at 1408 Rayner Street in Memphis, TN (2010)

An investigation conducted at Memphis disclosed that after 56 days on the run, the Kellys were staying at the residence of J.C. Tichenor. Special Agents from Birmingham, Alabama, were immediately dispatched to Memphis, where, in the early morning hours of September 26, 1933 a raid was conducted. George and Katherine Kelly were taken into custody by FBI Agents and Memphis police officers Sergeant William Raney and officer Thomas Waterson. Caught without a weapon, George Kelly supposedly cried, "Don’t shoot, G-Men! Don’t shoot, G-Men!" as he surrendered to FBI Agents. The term (which had applied to all federal investigators, meaning simply 'Government Men') became synonymous with FBI Agents. Reports of the raid, however, indicate that George Kelly came to the door, dropped his pistol and said, "I’ve been waiting for you all night." Recent research revealed a 1933 newspaper interview with one of the federal agents at the arrest. He commented that, upon their arrest, Kathryn Kelly put her arms around George and said, "These G-men will never leave us alone." The FBI press machine generated the G-Man story to build its own reputation.

On October 12, 1933, George and Katherine Kelly were convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. The trial was held at the Post Office, Courthouse and Federal Office Building in Oklahoma City. Katherine Kelly and her mother had all charges dropped and were released in 1958 from prison in Cincinnati.

The kidnapping of Urschel and the two trials that resulted were historic in several ways: 1) they were the first, last, and only federal criminal trials in the United States in which moving cameras were allowed to film; 2) the first kidnapping trials after the passage of the so-called Lindbergh Law, which made kidnapping a federal crime; 3) the first major case solved by J. Edgar Hoover’s evolving and powerful FBI. For that, Kelly got sent into Alcatraz; 4) the first crime in which defendants were transported by airplane. At the time, it was the largest ransom ever paid in the United States.

Machine Gun Kelly spent his remaining 21 years in prison. During his time at Alcatraz he got the nickname "Pop Gun Kelly." This was in reference, according to a former prisoner, to the fact that Kelly was a model prisoner and was nowhere near the tough, brutal gangster his wife made him out to be. He spent 17 years on Alcatraz, working in the prison industries, and was quietly transferred back to Leavenworth in 1951. He died of a heart attack at Leavenworth Federal Prison, Kansas on July 18, 1954 - his 59th birthday.

He is buried at Cottondale Texas Cemetery with a small headstone marked "George B. Kelley 1954".

Alcatraz - Famous Inmates - Al Capone

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 11:00:00 +0000

Alphonse Gabriel "Al" Capone (January 17, 1899 – January 25, 1947) was an Italian-American gangster who led a Prohibition-era crime syndicate. Known as the "Capones", the group was dedicated to
smuggling and bootlegging liquor, and other illegal activities such as prostitution, in Chicago from the early 1920s to 1931.

Born in Brooklyn, New York to Italian immigrants, Capone became involved with gang activity at a young age after being expelled from school at age 14. In his early twenties, he moved to Chicago to take advantage of a new opportunity to make money smuggling illegal alcoholic beverages into the city during Prohibition. He also engaged in various other criminal activities, including bribery of government figures and prostitution.

Despite his illegitimate occupation, Capone became a highly visible public figure. He made various charitable endeavors using the money he made from his activities, and was viewed by many to be a "modern-day Robin Hood".

However, Capone gained infamy when the public discovered his involvement in the Saint Valentine's Day Massacre, which resulted in the death of seven of Capone's rival gang members. Capone's reign ended when he was found guilty of tax evasion, and sent to federal prison. His incarceration included a stay at Alcatraz federal prison.

Though he adjusted relatively well to his new environment, he did encounter problems at Alcatraz. While working in the prison basement, Capone got into an argument with an inmate who was standing in line waiting for a haircut, who stabbed Capone with a pair of shears. Capone was admitted into the prison hospital and released a few days later with a minor wound. He spent the last year of his sentence in the prison hospital, confused and disoriented. Capone completed his term in Alcatraz on January 6, 1939, and was transferred to the Federal Correctional Institution at Terminal Island in California, to serve his one-year misdemeanor sentence. He was paroled on November 16, 1939, spent a short time in a hospital, then returned to his home in Palm Island, Florida. In the final years of Capone's life, his mental and physical health deteriorated due to neurosyphilis, a disease which he had contracted earlier. On January 25, 1947, he died from cardiac arrest after suffering a stroke.

Alcatraz - Escape Attempts

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 10:50:00 +0000

During its 29 years of operation, the penitentiary claimed no prisoners had ever successfully escaped. 36 prisoners were involved in 14 attempts, two men trying twice; 23 were caught, six were shot and
killed during their escape, and three were lost at sea and never found. The most violent occurred on May 2, 1946 when a failed escape attempt by six prisoners led to the so-called Battle of Alcatraz.

On June 11, 1962, Frank Morris, John Anglin and Clarence Anglin successfully carried out one of the most intricate escapes ever devised. Behind the prisoners' cells in Cell Block B (where the escapees were interned) was an unguarded 3-foot (0.91 m) wide utility corridor. The prisoners chiseled away the moisture-damaged concrete from around an air vent leading to this corridor, using tools such as a metal spoon soldered with silver from a dime and an electric drill improvised from a stolen vacuum cleaner motor. The noise was disguised by accordions played during music hour, and their progress was concealed by false walls which, in the dark recesses of the cells, fooled the guards.

The escape route then led up through a fan vent; the fan and motor had been removed and replaced with a steel grille, leaving a shaft large enough for a prisoner to climb through. Stealing a carborundum cord from the prison workshop, the prisoners had removed the rivets from the grille and substituted dummy rivets made of soap. The escapees also constructed an inflatable raft from several stolen raincoats for the trip to the mainland. Leaving papier-mâché dummies in their cells affixed with stolen human hair from the barbershop, they escaped. The prisoners are estimated to have entered San Francisco Bay at 10 p.m.

The official investigation by the FBI was aided by another prisoner, Allen West, who also was part of the escapees' group but was left behind (West's false wall kept slipping so he held it into place with cement, which set; when the Anglin brothers (John and Clarence) accelerated the schedule, West desperately chipped away at the wall, but by the time he did his companions were gone). Articles belonging to the prisoners (including plywood paddles and parts of the raincoat raft) were located on nearby Angel Island, and the official report on the escape says the prisoners drowned while trying to reach the mainland in the cold waters of the bay.

The MythBusters investigated the myth, concluding such an escape was plausible.

The attempt was the subject of the 1979 film Escape from Alcatraz with screenplay by Richard Tuggle; directed by Don Siegel and starring Clint Eastwood as Frank Morris, Jack Thibeau as Clarence Anglin and Fred Ward as John Anglin.

Alcatraz - Military History

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 10:38:00 +0000

The earliest recorded owner of the island of Alcatraz is one Julian Workman, to whom it was given by Mexican governor Pio Pico in June 1846 with the understanding that the former would build a lighthouse on it.
Julian Workman is the baptismal name of William Workman, co-owner of Rancho La Puente and personal friend of Pio Pico. Later in 1846, acting in his capacity as Military Governor of California, John C. Fremont, champion of Manifest Destiny and leader of the Bear Flag Republic, bought the island for $5000 in the name of the United States government from Francis Temple.

In 1850, President Millard Fillmore ordered that Alcatraz Island be set aside specifically for military purposes based upon the U.S. acquisition of California from Mexico following the Mexican-American War. Fremont had expected a large compensation for his initiative in purchasing and securing Alcatraz Island for the U.S. government, but the U.S. government later invalidated the sale and paid Fremont nothing. Fremont and his heirs sued for compensation during protracted but unsuccessful legal battles that extended into the 1890s.

Following the acquisition of California by the United States as a result of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848) which ended the Mexican-American War, and the onset of the California Gold Rush the following year, the U.S. Army began studying the suitability of Alcatraz Island for the positioning of coastal batteries to protect the approaches to San Francisco Bay. In 1853, under the direction of Zealous B. Tower, the Corps of Engineers began fortifying the island, work which continued until 1858, eventuating in Fortress Alcatraz. The island's first garrison at Camp Alcatraz, numbering about 200 soldiers and 11 cannons, arrived at the end of that year. When the American Civil War broke out in 1861 the island mounted 85 cannons (increased to 105 cannons by 1866) in casemates around its perimeter, though the small size of the garrison meant only a fraction of the guns could be used at one time. At this time it also served as the San Francisco Arsenal for storage of firearms to prevent them falling into the hands of Southern sympathizers. Alcatraz never fired its guns offensively, though during the war it was used to imprison Confederate sympathizers and privateers on the west coast.

Alcatraz - Prison

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 10:32:00 +0000

The United States Disciplinary Barracks on Alcatraz was acquired by the United States Department of Justice on October 12, 1933, and the island became a Federal Bureau of Prisons federal prison in
August 1934. During the 29 years it was in use, the jail held such notable criminals as Al Capone, Robert Franklin Stroud (the Birdman of Alcatraz), George "Machine Gun" Kelly, James "Whitey" Bulger, Bumpy Johnson, Rafael Cancel Miranda, member of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party who attacked the United States Capitol building in 1954, Mickey Cohen, Arthur R. "Doc" Barker and Alvin Karpis (who served more time at Alcatraz than any other inmate). It also provided housing for the Bureau of Prison staff and their families.

Because it was far more expensive to operate than other prisons (nearly $10 per prisoner per day, as opposed to $3 per prisoner per day at Atlanta), and due to half a century of salt water saturation which severely eroded the buildings, the penitentiary was closed on March 21, 1963 by decision of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. Another contributing factor for the closure was the pollution produced by the sewage deposited into San Francisco bay from the approximately 250 inmates and 60 Bureau of Prisons families on the island. The United States Penitentiary in Marion, Illinois, a traditional land-bound prison, opened that same year to serve as a replacement for Alcatraz.

The entire Alcatraz Island was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1976, and was further declared a National Historic Landmark in 1986. In 1993, the National Park Service published a plan entitled Alcatraz Development Concept and Environmental Assessment. This plan, approved in 1980, doubled the amount of Alcatraz accessible to the public to enable visitors to enjoy its scenery and bird, marine, and animal life, such as the California slender salamander.

Alcatraz - History

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 10:22:00 +0000

The first Spaniard to document the island was Juan Manuel de Ayala in 1775, who charted San Francisco Bay and named the island "La Isla de los Alcatraces," which translates as "The Island of the Pelicans,
from the archaic Spanish alcatraz, "pelican", a word which was borrowed originally from Arabic, meaning sea eagle. In modern Spanish, the word alcatraz stands for gannet. The United States Census Bureau defines the island as Block 1067, Block Group 1, Census Tract 179.02 of San Francisco County, California. There was no permanent population on the island as of the 2000 census. It is home to the now-abandoned prison, the site of the oldest operating lighthouse on the west coast of the United States, early military fortifications, and natural features such as rock pools, a seabird colony (mostly Western Gulls, cormorants, and egrets), and unique views of the coastline.

Beginning on November 20, 1969, a group of Native Americans from many different tribes occupied the island, and proposed an education center, ecology center and cultural center. According to the occupants, the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868) between the U.S. and the Sioux included provisions to return all retired, abandoned or out-of-use federal land to the Native people from whom it was acquired. (Note: The Treaty of 1868 stated that all abandoned or unused federal land adjacent to the Sioux Reservation could be reclaimed by descendants of the Sioux Nation.) With the clarification, Indians of All Tribes abandoned the Sioux treaty as the basis of their occupation and claimed Alcatraz Island by "Right of Discovery". Begun by urban Indians in San Francisco, some of whom were descended from people who relocated there under the Federal Indian Reorganization Act of 1934), the occupation attracted other Native Americans from across the country, including American Indian Movement (AIM) activists from Minneapolis.

An example of policies which Native Americans objected to was pressure put on the Moqui Hopi in 1895, when they were one of the largest Indian groups being held as military prisoners by the US. The U.S. government offered to release them if they agreed to send their children to U.S. Indian schools. The Hopi refused, believing this would cause their culture to deteriorate and force assimilation. The effect of the policy was to break any positive relations the Hopi may have built with the U.S. government. During the nineteen months and nine days of occupation, several buildings were damaged or destroyed by fire, including the recreation hall, the Coast Guard quarters and the Warden's home. The origins of the fires are unknown. The U.S. government demolished a number of other buildings (mostly apartments) after the occupation had ended. Graffiti from the period of Native American occupation are still visible at many locations on the island. During the occupation, the Indian termination policy, designed to end federal recognition of tribes, was rescinded by President Richard Nixon. He established a new policy of self-determination, in part as a result of the publicity and awareness created by the occupation. The occupation ended on June 11, 1971. The results of Alcatraz inspired other political actions: the Trail of Broken Treaties and the Longest Walk in 1985. The occupation of Alcatraz played a large role in changing self-perception for many Native Americans. It is defined as a key movement in their struggle for what some felt was rightfully theirs. Following a succession of demands at Alcatraz, the U.S. government returned excess, unused land to the Taos, Yakama, Navajo and Washoe tribes.

Golden Gate National Recreation Area

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 10:11:00 +0000

The Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA) is a U.S. National Recreation Area administered by the National Park Service that surrounds the San Francisco Bay area. It is one of the most visited
units of the National Park system in the United States, with over 13 million visitors a year. It is also one of the largest urban parks in the world, with a size two-and-a-half times that of the consolidated city and county of San Francisco.

The park is not one continuous locale, but rather a collection of areas that stretch from northern San Mateo County to southern Marin County, and includes several areas of San Francisco. The park is as diverse as it is expansive; it contains famous tourist attractions such as Muir Woods National Monument, Alcatraz, and the Presidio of San Francisco. The GGNRA is also home to 1,273 plant and animal species, encompasses 59 miles (95 km) of bay and ocean shoreline and has military fortifications that span centuries of California history, from the Spanish conquistadors to Cold War-era Nike missile sites.

The park was created thanks in large part to efforts to create it by Congressman Phillip Burton. In 1972, President Richard Nixon signed into law "An Act to Establish the Golden Gate National Recreation Area." The bill allocated $120 million for land acquisition and development. The National Park Service first purchased Alcatraz and Fort Mason from the U.S. Army. Then to complete the national park in the north bay, the Nature Conservancy purchased the land in the Marin Headlands that made up the failed development project called Marincello from the Gulf Oil Corporation. The Nature Conservancy then transferred the land to the GGNRA. These properties formed the initial basis for the park.

In 1988, UNESCO designated the GGNRA and 12 adjacent protected areas the Golden Gate Biosphere Reserve.

In February 2005, Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation in the United States Senate that would add 4,700 acres (1,900 ha) of natural land to the GGNRA in San Mateo County including a 4,076 parcel known as the Rancho Corral de Tierra. The property, located south of Pacifica and surrounding the communities of Moss Beach and Montara, is home to many diverse plant and animal species. The bill passed in the Senate, but did not pass the House of Representatives.

Alcatraz Island

noreply@blogger.com (ParkYank) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 10:05:00 +0000

Alcatraz Island is an island located in the San Francisco Bay, 1.5 miles (2.4 km) offshore from San Francisco, California, United States. Often referred to as The Rock, the small island early-on served as
a lighthouse, a military fortification, a military prison, and a Federal Bureau of Prisons federal prison until 1963. Later, in 1972, Alcatraz became a national recreation area and received landmarking designations in 1976 and 1986.

Today, the island is a historic site operated by the National Park Service as part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and is open to tours. Visitors can reach the island by ferry ride from Pier 33, near Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco. In 2008 the nation's first hybrid propulsion ferry started serving the island. Alcatraz has been featured in many movies, TV shows, cartoons, books, comics, and games.

The island, once an 1850s military fort, is the site of the West Coast’s first lighthouse (since replaced by the current lighthouse) and the birthplace of the Native American “Red Power” movement. Gardens, tidepools, nesting birds, and bay views beyond compare are also among its attractions.

Alcatraz was the home of the West Coast’s first lighthouse. Equipped with a simple oil lamp, the Alcatraz light began guiding ships through the narrow entrance to the bay in 1854

A walk around Alcatraz can be a breathtaking experience. The island is one of the bay’s best vista points, a place surrounded by mountains, bridges, ships, and skylines. The most spectacular views can be seen from the Agave Trail (open approximately October through February, when the birds aren’t nesting), the parade ground, and the lighthouse plaza. Apart from the 360-degree panorama of the bay, a walk on Alcatraz takes you along rocky cliffs, past colonies of western gull nests, and through areas overgrown with exotic flowers and trees.