United States Penitentiary, Leavenworth

The United States Penitentiary (USP), Leavenworth is located in Kansas on 1,583 acres (6.4 km²) with 22.8 acres (92,000 m²) inside the penitentiary walls. The USP Leavenworth came into existence through an act of Congress in 1895. It is an all-male high security level facility committed to carrying out the judgments of the Federal Courts.

History timeline

1827 - Colonel Henry Leavenworth chose site for new fort.

1875 - Fort chosen as the site for a military prison. Within a year, Ft. Leavenworth housed more than 300 prisoners in a remodeled supply depot building.

1894 - Secretary of War conceded to the House Appropriations Committee that War Department could do without the military prison.

1895 - Congress transferred the military prison from the War Department to the Department of Justice. (July 1)

1895 - July 1 - the Department of Justice took over the plant and inaugurated the United States Penitentiary. Commandant of the military prison, James V. Pope. Warden of the USP, James W. French.

1896 - House Judiciary Committee recommended that the facility be replaced.

1896 - June 10 - the Congress authorized a new federal penitentiary.

1897 - Spring (March) - Warden French marched prisoners every morning two and one-half miles (4 km) from Ft. Leavenworth to the new site of the federal penitentiary. (Work went on for two and one-half decades).

1899 - July 1 - Robert W. McClaughry was appointed Leavenworth's 2nd Warden.

1901 - November 10 - Joseph Waldrupe was the first correctional officer to be killed (records dating back to 1901) in the line of duty at Leavenworth.

1903 - Enough space was under roof to permit the first 418 prisoners to move into the new federal penitentiary.

1904 - First Cell house completed

1906 - February 1, all prisoners had been transferred to the new facility, and the War Department appreciatively accepted the return of its prison.

1910 - May, the Attorney General approved construction of a separate cellblock for females on the penitentiary grounds - plan was later abandoned.

1913 - June, T. W. Morgan, editor of a newspaper in the small Kansas town of Ottawa, was appointed Leavenworth's 3rd Warden.

1919 - Construction of the cellblocks completed.

1926 - Construction of the shoe shops completed.

1928 - Construction of the brush and broom factory completed.

1930 - May - the Bureau of Prison's became a federal agency within the Department of Justice.

1930 - September 5 - Carl Panzram becomes the first to be executed (records dating back to 1927) by hanging at Leavenworth.

1934 - December 11 - President Franklin Roosevelt authorized the first federal prison industries as a public corporation.

1938 - August 12 - Robert Suhay and Glenn Applegate the first double execution (records dating back to 1927) by hanging at Leavenworth.

External links

• http://www.lvarea.com/data/usp_info.htm