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Missouri State Penitentiary
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Missouri State Penitentiary
The Missouri State Penitentiary was a prison in Jefferson City, Missouri, that operated from 1836 to 2004. Part of the Missouri Department of Corrections, it served as the state of Missouri's primary maximum security institution. Before it closed, it was the oldest operating penal facility west of the Mississippi River. It was replaced by the Jefferson City Correctional Center, which opened on September 15, 2004. The penitentiary is now a tourist attraction, and guided tours are offered.
The Missouri State Penitentiary was designed by John Haviland and constructed in the early 1830s to serve the newly admitted (1821) state of Missouri. Jefferson City had been designated the state capital in 1822, and Governor John Miller suggested that the state's main prison be constructed there to help the city maintain its somewhat tenuous status against other towns trying to obtain the capitol for themselves. James Dunnica, a master stonemason who built the first Capitol building in Jefferson City in 1826, was appointed to oversee construction of the new prison, and $25,000 was allotted by the legislature for expenses. The facility opened for business in March 1836, the same month as the fall of the Alamo in Texas.
Prisoners were employed during the 1830s in making bricks; the initial prison population consisted of one guard, one warden, fifteen prisoners, and a foreman for the brick-making operation with an assistant. Eleven of the fifteen prisoners were from St. Louis, and all were incarcerated for larceny except for one, who was imprisoned for stabbing a man during a drunken brawl.
A-Hall, also known as Housing Unit A and Housing Unit 4, was completed in 1868. Designed by Warden Horace Swift, the structure was constructed from stone quarried on-site and built primarily using convict labor. The building remained in continuous use as a housing facility until the prison's permanent closure and remains standing as of 2026.
In its daily "Times Past" column, the Irish Times ran the following column in 1990 and 2000:
Tired of Irish Stew
Jefferson City, Missouri.
Some five hundred more convicts at the Missouri State Penitentiary mutinied to-day. Seven hundred and fifty prisoners in the same institution struck yesterday, following on the refusal of their demand for grilled meat instead of the continual Irish stew, and refused to leave the dining hall, though they were subsequently persuaded to disperse peaceably by the Governor.
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Missouri State Penitentiary
The Missouri State Penitentiary was a prison in Jefferson City, Missouri, that operated from 1836 to 2004. Part of the Missouri Department of Corrections, it served as the state of Missouri's primary maximum security institution. Before it closed, it was the oldest operating penal facility west of the Mississippi River. It was replaced by the Jefferson City Correctional Center, which opened on September 15, 2004. The penitentiary is now a tourist attraction, and guided tours are offered.
The Missouri State Penitentiary was designed by John Haviland and constructed in the early 1830s to serve the newly admitted (1821) state of Missouri. Jefferson City had been designated the state capital in 1822, and Governor John Miller suggested that the state's main prison be constructed there to help the city maintain its somewhat tenuous status against other towns trying to obtain the capitol for themselves. James Dunnica, a master stonemason who built the first Capitol building in Jefferson City in 1826, was appointed to oversee construction of the new prison, and $25,000 was allotted by the legislature for expenses. The facility opened for business in March 1836, the same month as the fall of the Alamo in Texas.
Prisoners were employed during the 1830s in making bricks; the initial prison population consisted of one guard, one warden, fifteen prisoners, and a foreman for the brick-making operation with an assistant. Eleven of the fifteen prisoners were from St. Louis, and all were incarcerated for larceny except for one, who was imprisoned for stabbing a man during a drunken brawl.
A-Hall, also known as Housing Unit A and Housing Unit 4, was completed in 1868. Designed by Warden Horace Swift, the structure was constructed from stone quarried on-site and built primarily using convict labor. The building remained in continuous use as a housing facility until the prison's permanent closure and remains standing as of 2026.
In its daily "Times Past" column, the Irish Times ran the following column in 1990 and 2000:
Tired of Irish Stew
Jefferson City, Missouri.
Some five hundred more convicts at the Missouri State Penitentiary mutinied to-day. Seven hundred and fifty prisoners in the same institution struck yesterday, following on the refusal of their demand for grilled meat instead of the continual Irish stew, and refused to leave the dining hall, though they were subsequently persuaded to disperse peaceably by the Governor.
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