WEBVTT - How the Escape from Alcatraz Worked 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:02.640 Hey, everybody, it's us and we're here to talk to 0:00:02.720 --> 0:00:05.160 you about get this our book. We have a Stuff 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:07.520 you Should Know book coming out this November and you're 0:00:07.560 --> 0:00:09.479 going to love it and you can preorder it now. 0:00:09.840 --> 0:00:14.080 That's right. It's called Stuff you Should Know Colon, an 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:18.360 incomplete compendium of mostly interesting things, and it's been a 0:00:18.400 --> 0:00:20.880 lot of fun to work on and we're really, i 0:00:20.920 --> 0:00:23.360 mean genuinely excited about how this thing has come together. 0:00:23.880 --> 0:00:27.720 It's twenties six chunky Harry chapters that are just going 0:00:27.760 --> 0:00:30.159 to knock your socks clean off. And yes, Chuck, we 0:00:30.200 --> 0:00:34.280 are indeed proud of this book. It is truly, indubitably 0:00:34.400 --> 0:00:36.640 the first Stuff you Should note book and it's coming 0:00:36.640 --> 0:00:39.319 out this November and you can order it now, pre 0:00:39.479 --> 0:00:42.960 order everywhere you get books, so do that, and we 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:47.280 thank you in advice. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, 0:00:47.520 --> 0:00:56.080 a production of our Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, 0:00:56.120 --> 0:00:59.400 and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, there's Chuck, Jerry's 0:00:59.400 --> 0:01:03.200 out there and that ether somewhere. Um like that one 0:01:03.280 --> 0:01:08.080 kid being transmitted from the camera to the TV in 0:01:08.200 --> 0:01:12.560 Willy Wonka. Wow, I got that one eight kinds of wrong. 0:01:13.520 --> 0:01:16.360 But anyway, this is stuff you should know which is appropriate? 0:01:17.840 --> 0:01:20.280 Did I would get something eight kinds of wrong right 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:22.479 at the beginning. Did you ever hear the story from 0:01:22.600 --> 0:01:25.040 Gene Wilder about the move at the beginning of that 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:28.080 movie where he walks out with a cane where he 0:01:28.240 --> 0:01:30.960 did the spill the summersault. Yeah, he see sticks a 0:01:31.000 --> 0:01:33.520 cane in the ground and does a summer salt. He 0:01:33.600 --> 0:01:36.480 said that that was his idea. And this just shows 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:39.000 the brilliance of Gene Wilder, And he said he did 0:01:39.040 --> 0:01:41.920 that because he knew from that moment on no one 0:01:41.959 --> 0:01:45.680 would believe anything that that character said. Oh yes, I 0:01:46.040 --> 0:01:49.240 have heard that before. That is that is brilliant. That 0:01:49.320 --> 0:01:51.520 man was a brilliant man in a wonderful human being. 0:01:51.600 --> 0:01:53.520 I loved him. He's got One of his last interviews 0:01:53.520 --> 0:01:55.680 on Conan O'Brien was so great because Conan was just 0:01:56.360 --> 0:02:00.400 gushing and Gene Wilder was very I think, kind of 0:02:00.400 --> 0:02:04.280 taken back by how much he means to people. Um uh, 0:02:04.880 --> 0:02:07.960 have you ever seen? Oh no, that wasn't the question 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:11.040 I had. Did you know? Did you know that? The 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:15.200 question was did you fart? Did you know that Conan 0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:19.519 O'Brien and Dennis Leary are cousins. I don't think I 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:24.359 knew that. According to Conan O'Brien asking a question on Jeopardy, 0:02:24.400 --> 0:02:29.080 that is his cousin did not know that. Uh. Speaking 0:02:29.120 --> 0:02:34.160 of Jeopardy, Uh, we have a colleague named Ken Jennings 0:02:34.560 --> 0:02:39.959 who was on Jeopardy. And we have another colleague, two 0:02:40.000 --> 0:02:44.239 colleagues called Daniel and Jorge, and they have a um 0:02:44.280 --> 0:02:46.799 A podcast called Daniel and Jorge Explained the Universe. It's 0:02:46.800 --> 0:02:49.760 pretty cool. But they also, Chuck, I just saw have 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:53.880 a PBS Kids animated program coming out September seven called 0:02:53.880 --> 0:02:58.960 Eleanor Wonders Why and it looks adorable. Wow. That sounds 0:02:59.000 --> 0:03:01.519 like right at my daughter, Alley. Yeah, so check it 0:03:01.560 --> 0:03:04.800 out everybody. PBS Kids September seven, Eleanor Wonders Why And 0:03:04.840 --> 0:03:07.800 congrats Daniel and Jorgey. Do you have any famous cousins, 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:13.240 famous or infamous? I think we are the famous cousins. 0:03:13.280 --> 0:03:16.160 That's that's how sad our families are. Yeah, it feels 0:03:16.160 --> 0:03:18.519 pretty great, though. I keep being like, hey, let's have 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:25.600 another family reunion this month. Speaking of infamous cousins, Chuck, 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:31.239 how about those Anglan brothers. Huh? Yeah, man, this is uh. 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:33.240 I could have thought I kind of thought, we did this, 0:03:33.320 --> 0:03:35.120 I know we do, we do one on Alcatraz, and 0:03:35.160 --> 0:03:38.880 maybe it just briefly touched on it. Absolutely because this 0:03:39.000 --> 0:03:42.960 is uh, this movie, the nineteen what was it seventy 0:03:43.040 --> 0:03:48.480 nine Escape from Alcatraz movie with Clint Eastwood was one 0:03:48.480 --> 0:03:51.920 of my favorite movies as a kid. It's a good movie. 0:03:51.960 --> 0:03:53.920 I went. I watched it just the other night as 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:56.800 part of this. Yeah, it was an HBO special, so 0:03:57.240 --> 0:03:58.800 I must have been. I didn't see it in when 0:03:58.800 --> 0:04:00.880 I was eight, and probably was like ten or eleven, 0:04:01.360 --> 0:04:03.480 and it was one of those movies I probably watched 0:04:04.640 --> 0:04:07.360 over a dozen times when I was twelve twelve years old, 0:04:07.720 --> 0:04:11.120 followed by Krull and Outline. Oh man, those are great. 0:04:12.640 --> 0:04:15.560 They always went together, though, didn't they? Yeah, in war games. 0:04:15.600 --> 0:04:17.600 I mean that those are all HBO specials. But this 0:04:17.640 --> 0:04:20.360 is a really good movie. And I'm a big, big 0:04:20.400 --> 0:04:24.440 fan of prison escape movies. And I was thinking today 0:04:24.440 --> 0:04:27.400 when I was looking over this stuff again that it's 0:04:27.440 --> 0:04:31.200 so weird that like, these guys are hard and criminals, 0:04:32.080 --> 0:04:34.960 and yet when you're researching this, all you can think 0:04:35.000 --> 0:04:37.640 about is, oh man, I hope they got out of there, 0:04:38.240 --> 0:04:40.000 and I hope they lived the fat life in Brazil. 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:43.320 Well that really speaks to like who they are, what 0:04:43.400 --> 0:04:46.800 they became because of this escape, which is put most 0:04:46.880 --> 0:04:50.040 simply their folk heroes, I guess. So, Yeah, that's definitely 0:04:50.080 --> 0:04:51.599 a part of being a folk hero is that you 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:57.640 can transcend the kind of like judgments that society typically 0:04:57.760 --> 0:05:01.080 levies against people like criminals. Like if you if you 0:05:01.120 --> 0:05:03.560 are so good at your craft, are so good at 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:08.799 something to do with criminality that, um, you transcend being 0:05:08.880 --> 0:05:11.960 judged for your crimes. That's you've become a folk hero 0:05:12.120 --> 0:05:14.240 for sure. It's like dB Cooper. Yeah, and I think 0:05:14.279 --> 0:05:16.800 it helps that. Uh you know, these guys were armed 0:05:16.880 --> 0:05:20.480 robbers and thieves and I think Frank Morris and we'll 0:05:20.480 --> 0:05:22.240 get into all these who these dudes are, but he 0:05:22.279 --> 0:05:25.560 was a drug trafficker. But they weren't rapist and murderers 0:05:25.560 --> 0:05:28.240 that I don't think you can transcend that, know, they 0:05:28.560 --> 0:05:33.200 they were definitely non violent criminals from everything that I've seen. 0:05:33.760 --> 0:05:36.080 They used to toy gun in one of these robberies. Yeah, 0:05:36.080 --> 0:05:38.640 it's adorable. Well, let's talk about these guys like you 0:05:38.680 --> 0:05:41.400 were saying, Um, we're talking about a group of people 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:44.440 who escaped from Alcatraz, and as far as anyone knows, 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:47.919 they are the only ones who really may have escaped 0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:51.760 from Alcatraz. They vanished in nineteen sixty two, um, last 0:05:51.800 --> 0:05:55.240 seen leaving their cells and were never heard from again. 0:05:56.040 --> 0:05:59.120 And like you said, they were all hardened criminals, like 0:05:59.279 --> 0:06:03.680 lifelong rear criminals. Frank Morris was thirty five when he 0:06:03.760 --> 0:06:06.640 left Alcatraz, and he had been a criminal since he 0:06:06.680 --> 0:06:10.960 was thirteen. Um, he was in and out of institutions, 0:06:11.400 --> 0:06:13.479 and like he said, he wasn't a violent criminal. He 0:06:13.640 --> 0:06:16.080 wasn't a rapist or murder or anything like that. He 0:06:16.200 --> 0:06:19.760 was he was he liked to to to sell the drugs. 0:06:20.160 --> 0:06:24.120 He had, like his forehead tattooed or a star tattooed 0:06:24.120 --> 0:06:26.920 on his forehead for a while, which he very sensibly 0:06:26.960 --> 0:06:30.159 had removed later on. Um, is that what that means 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:34.760 but that he was a drug trafficker? No, I think 0:06:34.800 --> 0:06:36.839 that means that he did a few too many drugs 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:39.520 one night. Oh he really did have a star. Yeah, 0:06:39.560 --> 0:06:41.640 I thought that was some like prison thing for like 0:06:41.720 --> 0:06:44.960 the tear drop tattoo means you doesn't that mean you 0:06:45.000 --> 0:06:47.880 killed somebody or something. That's what I've always heard. But 0:06:47.920 --> 0:06:50.120 I don't know. It could just be or been legend, 0:06:50.160 --> 0:06:52.200 but yes, what I've always heard he really did have 0:06:52.240 --> 0:06:54.280 a star. Okay, yeah, I think he got super wasted, 0:06:55.160 --> 0:06:57.760 had a star tattooed on his forehead. There was a 0:06:57.760 --> 0:07:03.080 tattoo or just far too handy that yeah, yeah, which 0:07:03.279 --> 0:07:05.120 I think the old saying don't ever make friends with 0:07:05.160 --> 0:07:10.160 tattoo artists or at least drinking buddies. Sure, that's true. 0:07:10.480 --> 0:07:13.120 But he was also super smart too. Yeah, And they 0:07:13.160 --> 0:07:16.160 point this out in the movie, um and a lot 0:07:16.160 --> 0:07:18.040 of the movie. I mean, it's pretty close to the 0:07:18.080 --> 0:07:20.040 real story that they did a really good job, but 0:07:20.520 --> 0:07:22.200 they do make a big deal in the movie about 0:07:22.200 --> 0:07:25.720 how smart he was. I know i Q is sort 0:07:25.760 --> 0:07:27.880 of taking or leave it as far as uh that 0:07:28.000 --> 0:07:31.440 being a real measurement of one's intelligence. But he supposedly 0:07:31.480 --> 0:07:34.520 had an i Q of one thirty and the b 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:37.880 o P which stands for the was it Bureau of Prisons. 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:41.280 I didn't know they had rankings, but they had rankings 0:07:41.400 --> 0:07:47.440 of uh intellectual intellectuality? Is that a word? Uh? Yeah, 0:07:47.480 --> 0:07:50.680 I think so it gets the point across ergo it is. Yeah, 0:07:50.720 --> 0:07:53.320 And I'm curious what other rankings they have. But Um, 0:07:53.360 --> 0:07:57.480 you know, best looking, best abs. But he was in 0:07:57.480 --> 0:08:01.120 the top two percent supposedly in the American prison system 0:08:01.160 --> 0:08:04.880 as far as his intellectual capabilities. Yeah, so you you 0:08:04.960 --> 0:08:06.520 hit on a point there. I think we need to 0:08:06.560 --> 0:08:10.440 at least at least bring up like the the movie 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:14.880 did follow the actual the truth of the matter fairly 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:20.120 closely in some cases. In other cases it veered wildly away, 0:08:20.240 --> 0:08:23.120 Like there was a character based on one guy who 0:08:23.200 --> 0:08:26.240 was very much involved, but they didn't even use his name, 0:08:26.320 --> 0:08:29.640 and they made him seem less involved than he actually was. Um, 0:08:29.680 --> 0:08:31.840 there's a lot that the movie gets wrong. But the 0:08:31.920 --> 0:08:36.040 problem with covering this is that there's so many gaps 0:08:36.080 --> 0:08:39.640 and holes that are so easily and casually filled in 0:08:40.440 --> 0:08:42.839 that you can't help but wonder, like, wait, was this 0:08:43.320 --> 0:08:46.120 was this detail provided by somebody who saw the movie 0:08:46.160 --> 0:08:49.440 and took the movie as fact, Like where are we exactly? 0:08:49.480 --> 0:08:53.640 And just how pure the knowledge and understanding is of 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:55.640 this escape. So you have to just kind of bear 0:08:55.679 --> 0:08:57.480 that in mind that it's a it's kind of a 0:08:57.520 --> 0:09:01.040 blur in the annals of crime as far as um 0:09:01.280 --> 0:09:05.800 factuality goes. Yeah, but it's a good story, great story, 0:09:05.840 --> 0:09:08.360 and most of this is pretty true. I think so. 0:09:08.480 --> 0:09:11.400 Frank Morris was four years into a fourteen year stint 0:09:12.080 --> 0:09:15.000 and this was for a bank robbery and he was 0:09:15.040 --> 0:09:22.120 transferred to the rock in nine sixty. It's Alcatraz. It's 0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:25.840 a prison island or an island prison, and so I 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:28.240 might say the island itself is a prison, which we'll 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:31.920 get to. And then his buddies you mentioned the England 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:35.920 brothers J W. John William and his younger brother Clarence. 0:09:36.760 --> 0:09:40.400 We're thirty and twenty nine years old, and they were 0:09:40.440 --> 0:09:44.160 from a very big family of migrant farm workers in 0:09:44.240 --> 0:09:47.400 South Georgia. They traveled all over the country where wherever 0:09:47.400 --> 0:09:50.520 the work was, basically as a big family, and they 0:09:50.559 --> 0:09:54.320 got into stealing things from people. Yeah, and they were 0:09:54.360 --> 0:09:56.840 the ones who used the toy gun. Later on, they 0:09:56.920 --> 0:10:01.280 were I think visiting family in a small town called Columbia, Alabama, 0:10:01.400 --> 0:10:04.760 which is in the southeast of the state, and they 0:10:05.040 --> 0:10:07.480 found out that this bank had been around for a 0:10:07.559 --> 0:10:09.959 hundred years in this town. It had never been robbed. 0:10:10.240 --> 0:10:12.680 So they assumed, we're going to change that. It'll be 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:15.160 easy to knock over. And apparently it was pretty easy 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:17.480 to knock over. And they had a toy gun that 0:10:17.480 --> 0:10:19.240 they used, and they still managed to get away with 0:10:19.720 --> 0:10:22.559 at least I think like ten grand or twenty grand something, 0:10:22.600 --> 0:10:25.280 a pretty substantial amount of money. And they were on 0:10:25.320 --> 0:10:27.320 the run for a little while but got caught in 0:10:27.360 --> 0:10:29.960 the Alabama AND's were not very happy with it, and 0:10:30.000 --> 0:10:33.439 they threw the book at these brothers. They got twenty 0:10:33.520 --> 0:10:36.520 five years sentences for robbing a bank with a toy gun, 0:10:37.040 --> 0:10:40.760 and that actually was way better than the sentence they 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:45.600 initially faced, which was the potentially the death panel. That's yeah, 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:48.280 so so they were they were. They were caught and busted. 0:10:48.320 --> 0:10:50.840 And they had a third brother named Alfred too, who 0:10:50.880 --> 0:10:53.240 was also involved, but he was never sent to that 0:10:53.400 --> 0:10:55.640 to the rock as you put it, I bet it 0:10:55.679 --> 0:10:58.480 was not a bet. It was actually a lot easier 0:10:58.520 --> 0:11:01.720 to rob banks back then. Yeah, it was way easier 0:11:01.800 --> 0:11:05.000 to be a criminal, even just a few decades ago. Yeah, 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:08.000 just in general, I think now it's like I don't 0:11:08.000 --> 0:11:10.200 even try, No, you got I mean, if it's not 0:11:10.280 --> 0:11:12.400 the cops and their cameras, he got some dumb neighbor 0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:17.360 with their cameras like me right, Oh man, I hate 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:20.280 to get off topics so quickly, and we should post 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:22.240 this on the Facebook page or something, or maybe I'll 0:11:22.240 --> 0:11:24.760 put it on Instagram. What I got attacked by a 0:11:24.760 --> 0:11:26.800 squirrel and it was captured by my front of the 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:30.360 house camera. Oh yeah, everyone wants to see that. This 0:11:30.440 --> 0:11:32.280 is great. I just I was taking out some recycling 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:33.800 and I heard some rustling, and I went around the 0:11:33.800 --> 0:11:36.400 corner and I was like, this squirrel was freaking out, 0:11:36.480 --> 0:11:39.360 and then he literally leapt if you freeze fram it, 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:42.880 he leapt three feet in the air and hit my 0:11:42.960 --> 0:11:44.600 leg and ran up my leg a little bit. And 0:11:44.600 --> 0:11:48.079 then wow, and I react thustily. That's awesome. You know, 0:11:48.120 --> 0:11:51.200 would be wonderful as to intercut close ups of your 0:11:51.240 --> 0:11:54.400 face when you got that Charlie Horse on internet round up. 0:11:54.440 --> 0:11:58.679 Oh my god, in this squirrel attack, it's a good thing. 0:11:58.720 --> 0:12:02.040 I don't care about myself and looking dumb. Why did you? 0:12:02.160 --> 0:12:03.880 Why did that squirrel attack you? What did you do 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:05.480 to it? I didn't do anything. It was freaking out. 0:12:05.520 --> 0:12:07.280 And then I turned and looked after I dropped the 0:12:07.280 --> 0:12:10.319 recycling off, and he and another squirrel we're going at 0:12:10.320 --> 0:12:12.760 it in our oak tree. So I think he was 0:12:12.840 --> 0:12:15.880 just he was all riled up. He might have been Yeah, 0:12:16.080 --> 0:12:18.320 did he have a star tattooed on his forehead, did 0:12:18.600 --> 0:12:22.320 right on his little tenty free forehead. Yes, please do 0:12:22.440 --> 0:12:26.040 post that. Okay, So all right, these guys are all 0:12:26.080 --> 0:12:31.320 in Alcatraz. And Alcatraz at the time was um. Like 0:12:31.360 --> 0:12:34.200 I said, it was sort of the rock itself was 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:37.000 the prison. And that was the idea was that even 0:12:37.040 --> 0:12:39.800 if you're even if you managed to get out of 0:12:39.840 --> 0:12:42.080 the prison that they eventually built, which we'll talk about, 0:12:42.559 --> 0:12:44.160 then you still can't get out of there because you 0:12:44.200 --> 0:12:47.559 gotta swim over a mile to the nearest body of land, 0:12:47.600 --> 0:12:50.760 about one point three miles. That water is really cold, 0:12:50.800 --> 0:12:54.080 the currents are brutal, the winds are really strong. San 0:12:54.080 --> 0:12:57.240 Francisco Bay is not you know, for people that haven't 0:12:57.240 --> 0:13:01.120 been there, it's not just some lovely little chill body 0:13:01.160 --> 0:13:03.400 of water that you hang out in. No, it's not 0:13:03.440 --> 0:13:07.360 a very hospitable body of water. It's not so um. 0:13:07.600 --> 0:13:10.560 The the idea was that, yeah, like when you got 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:14.000 sent to Alcatraz, you weren't getting off of that island 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:18.160 and you were either paroled or died. Um. And that 0:13:18.240 --> 0:13:20.640 was actually the reason that the England's and Frank Morris 0:13:20.679 --> 0:13:22.959 were sent there was because they had all met at 0:13:22.960 --> 0:13:25.719 the Federal pen and at Atlanta, I guess the wind 0:13:25.760 --> 0:13:29.280 down in Grant Park, right, Yeah, which that building is amazing. 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:32.559 It's one of the most forbidding buildings in the world. 0:13:33.240 --> 0:13:36.320 I would say it looks like an old timey federal penitentiary. 0:13:36.400 --> 0:13:38.480 Al Capone was there too for a little while. Yeah. 0:13:38.520 --> 0:13:40.640 I actually drove by there not too long ago with 0:13:40.679 --> 0:13:42.120 my daughter for the first time, and I was like, 0:13:42.360 --> 0:13:44.199 check out that building. Look at that. It's like, that's 0:13:44.200 --> 0:13:47.600 a prison to what's a prison? And I went, oh, well, 0:13:47.600 --> 0:13:49.480 I guess I got to explain that. I'll tell you 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:52.640 when you're eighteen if you make it and don't go 0:13:52.720 --> 0:13:56.040 to prison first. Right. So they all met at the 0:13:56.040 --> 0:13:58.360 Federal pen and Atlanta, and I can't remember if they 0:13:58.400 --> 0:14:00.600 actually made it out or if they were called escaping, 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:03.800 but they were known escape artists like the um Frank 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:07.439 Morris that escaped from places in Florida. Um. They didn't 0:14:07.480 --> 0:14:10.080 stay put when you when you put them in prison, 0:14:10.360 --> 0:14:12.559 and so that's why they were all sent to Alcatraz 0:14:13.000 --> 0:14:17.200 and just crazily as they arrived between nineteen sixty and 0:14:17.240 --> 0:14:20.680 nineteen sixty one, they were all put pretty close together, 0:14:20.880 --> 0:14:24.400 and in fact, the Angland brothers had adjoining cells, which 0:14:24.440 --> 0:14:26.400 is a very stupid thing to do, but that's what 0:14:26.440 --> 0:14:30.280 they did in part, I believe because there is a 0:14:30.320 --> 0:14:34.560 certain thread of arrogance that ran through the administration of 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:40.000 um Alcatraz that it was just basically inescapable. Yeah, and 0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:44.080 I think you also sort of want happy prisoners, and 0:14:44.880 --> 0:14:48.520 I've heard of request like that being made possible before, 0:14:48.640 --> 0:14:50.800 like hope you put me near my brother, We're gonna 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:53.640 be a lot better behaved. Yeah, we're definitely not going 0:14:53.720 --> 0:14:56.760 to to break out. Um. I don't think we mentioned either, 0:14:56.840 --> 0:15:00.400 Like Alcatraz was so formidable as a just an island 0:15:01.040 --> 0:15:03.080 that the very first time they used it was when 0:15:03.080 --> 0:15:07.840 the Army put soldiers there who who cheered on President 0:15:07.920 --> 0:15:11.360 Lincoln's death, And so they didn't even bother building a 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:13.520 prison though. They just built some barracks through them on 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:15.560 the island. It's like, well, you're in prison now, because 0:15:15.600 --> 0:15:17.720 good luck getting out of here. Yeah, that's what I 0:15:17.720 --> 0:15:22.120 saw too, um. And when the Bureau of Prisons took over, 0:15:22.760 --> 0:15:25.680 they they really fortified it even more. Like you said, 0:15:25.720 --> 0:15:29.040 there was a larger building that housed everything from like 0:15:29.080 --> 0:15:31.960 the mess hall to the cell blocks. So when you 0:15:31.960 --> 0:15:34.440 were in a cell in a cell block. You were 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:36.840 in you were in a little tiny prison inside a 0:15:36.920 --> 0:15:41.480 larger prison, inside this island prison. UM. And the cell 0:15:41.520 --> 0:15:45.080 blocks themselves had like three inch thick concrete walls, reinforced 0:15:45.120 --> 0:15:48.920 iron bars. The building itself was made a very thick concrete. 0:15:49.200 --> 0:15:52.160 It was it was just meant to to to basically 0:15:52.160 --> 0:15:54.960 tell you there's there's no getting out here. But UM, 0:15:55.480 --> 0:15:58.560 what's what's crazy is UM Frank Morris and the England Brothers. 0:15:58.600 --> 0:16:00.560 They weren't the first people to ever try to bust 0:16:00.600 --> 0:16:04.040 out UM. I believe they were part of a total 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:06.960 of thirty six people who tried to escape in the 0:16:07.040 --> 0:16:11.640 history of the prison. UM. Everybody else, almost everybody else 0:16:11.720 --> 0:16:16.160 was either UM killed, UH captured, or their bodies were 0:16:16.200 --> 0:16:21.280 found except and I did not realize this, UM Morris 0:16:21.280 --> 0:16:23.440 and the England Brothers were not the first people to 0:16:23.520 --> 0:16:26.680 vanish without a trace from Alcatraz. Had you heard about UM, 0:16:26.680 --> 0:16:29.760 Ted Cole and Ralph Roe. I hadn't heard about them 0:16:29.800 --> 0:16:34.000 until this, But in the thirties, late thirties, they did escape, 0:16:34.040 --> 0:16:38.040 and they did vanish, and you know, sort of like 0:16:38.040 --> 0:16:40.480 where this story is going there, I don't think anyone 0:16:40.560 --> 0:16:42.600 wants to admit that from the prison system that they 0:16:42.600 --> 0:16:45.320 could have really made it. So they're like, nah, they die, 0:16:45.400 --> 0:16:47.800 they drowned. But the thing is, the thing that really 0:16:47.840 --> 0:16:52.160 differentiates um, the England Brothers and Frank Morris from guys 0:16:52.200 --> 0:16:54.520 like Ted Cole and Ralph Roe. They all shared in 0:16:54.560 --> 0:16:57.520 common that they escaped from Alcatraz and vanished without a trace. 0:16:58.320 --> 0:17:01.560 The thing that differentiates Morris in the Englands is that 0:17:02.400 --> 0:17:06.639 they're folk heroes because almost exclusively because of this plan 0:17:07.280 --> 0:17:10.920 they devised and executed, and that the plan was so 0:17:11.000 --> 0:17:16.120 good and so complex and well done that it actually 0:17:16.200 --> 0:17:19.720 lends credence to the idea that they may have survived 0:17:19.800 --> 0:17:23.560 and escaped from Alcatraz genuinely. And what they had in 0:17:23.600 --> 0:17:26.359 common is that they were all top ten in best 0:17:26.400 --> 0:17:30.639 abs in the prison system. And what everybody listening right 0:17:30.680 --> 0:17:32.560 now has in common is that you're about to hear 0:17:32.600 --> 0:18:03.760 an ad to Okay, we're back everybody, UM, and I 0:18:03.760 --> 0:18:05.840 think it's high time we we talked about the plan, 0:18:05.960 --> 0:18:09.320 the escape plan, don't you. Yeah, if you're gonna escape 0:18:09.359 --> 0:18:12.200 from Alcatraz, Um, it's not the kind of thing where 0:18:12.280 --> 0:18:14.400 you distract a guard and just run and jump over 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:17.680 a fence. You gotta start this thing. Uh, this plan 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:21.919 many months in advance, and by all accounts they and 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:24.399 by all accounts meaning from the one account that we 0:18:24.440 --> 0:18:29.480 really have this, they started planning easily six months before 0:18:29.480 --> 0:18:32.920 the escape. They start developing this plan. They start collecting 0:18:33.840 --> 0:18:35.760 kind of anything they can get their hands on that 0:18:35.840 --> 0:18:40.240 they think they can use. Um everything from just loose 0:18:40.400 --> 0:18:44.720 nuts and bolts and screws to um things that I mean, 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:46.520 they actually ended up using a lot of this stuff, 0:18:46.520 --> 0:18:48.480 but I got the impression that they were just kind 0:18:48.480 --> 0:18:51.000 of like any time they saw something that they could 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:53.720 squirrel away and hide, they would do it because you 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:56.320 never know what you could use it for. Yeah, and 0:18:56.359 --> 0:18:59.520 so like over the six month period, they amassed something 0:18:59.560 --> 0:19:04.760 like a d tools that they either stole, had stolen 0:19:04.840 --> 0:19:09.359 for them rebuild, or repurposed out of other stuff, or 0:19:09.400 --> 0:19:12.719 just made completely out of like their own labor. Like, 0:19:12.760 --> 0:19:16.960 they had a pretty extensive toolkit that they created. UM. 0:19:17.160 --> 0:19:18.800 One of the ways that they got a lot of 0:19:18.840 --> 0:19:22.879 the tools was from Alan West, who we haven't mentioned yet, 0:19:23.560 --> 0:19:25.320 but a lot of people don't realize there was a 0:19:25.320 --> 0:19:30.840 fourth conspirator in the Alcatraz escape UM who was a 0:19:30.880 --> 0:19:34.239 major integral part of it. But who actually didn't go 0:19:34.359 --> 0:19:36.960 along with the escape As we'll see that part of 0:19:37.000 --> 0:19:40.119 the movie is so tough. It is, especially with that 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:43.000 poor guy. He he just looks came out of the 0:19:43.000 --> 0:19:47.359 womb like down on my luck? Can you spare a dime's? 0:19:49.640 --> 0:19:51.480 But he was, um, I think he was the guy 0:19:51.520 --> 0:19:57.000 who played Kramer on Seinfeld in the in the pilot, 0:19:57.080 --> 0:19:59.720 in the NBC pilot. Yeah, so like in the show 0:19:59.800 --> 0:20:02.880 the I playing Framer on the show. In the show, 0:20:02.960 --> 0:20:04.920 I think that was him that he stole the eminem's 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:09.159 I think, yeah, so he was an escape from Alcatraz 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:11.919 to Yeah, he just he's perfect for that part. But 0:20:12.000 --> 0:20:14.240 this guy named Alan West, he he was on the 0:20:14.240 --> 0:20:17.320 painting crew and he put that to use big time. 0:20:17.840 --> 0:20:19.320 One of the first ways he did it was he 0:20:19.359 --> 0:20:22.000 was in the prison barber shop and managed to steal 0:20:22.119 --> 0:20:24.760 a pair of electric clippers while he was in their 0:20:24.840 --> 0:20:27.640 painting and they were like, hey, this motor will come 0:20:27.680 --> 0:20:30.400 in handy. Well, let's repurpose it into a power drill, 0:20:30.480 --> 0:20:33.119 and they did, Yeah, that's pretty cool. He also, uh, 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:35.960 I mean just having a little motor so handy. So 0:20:36.119 --> 0:20:39.840 he came across a vacuum cleaner that wasn't working, and 0:20:39.840 --> 0:20:43.480 he said, hey, do you mind if I repair this? Uh, 0:20:43.560 --> 0:20:45.639 I gotta shake the tree first, but after that, you 0:20:45.640 --> 0:20:48.239 mind if I repair this? And that what they call 0:20:48.320 --> 0:20:51.480 it the vacuuming. No, and he got a pee on 0:20:51.520 --> 0:20:53.040 the on the chain gang that you call it shaking 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:57.960 the tree. Oh, I guess I think that's what it's called. Sure, 0:20:58.520 --> 0:20:59.920 But I mean it wasn't have to do with fixing 0:21:00.000 --> 0:21:03.280 a vacuum nothing. It's just prison humor. Oh. I got 0:21:04.440 --> 0:21:06.080 to me a lot of prison jokes. So all the 0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:09.560 inmates listening right now is busted out laughing. Like he said, 0:21:09.560 --> 0:21:14.440 shake the tree. Well, it's a drinking game. How we'll explain. 0:21:14.600 --> 0:21:16.720 If you're listening from prison, if someone says shake the tree, 0:21:16.720 --> 0:21:22.200 you take a drink of pruno. Well that's another drink. Yeah, 0:21:22.520 --> 0:21:25.000 that's the but that's what you would drink when somebody said, 0:21:25.040 --> 0:21:28.520 shake the tree, the tree one more time, Shake the tree, guys. 0:21:28.640 --> 0:21:31.000 I think everybody's got a pretty good buzzing prison right now. 0:21:31.080 --> 0:21:33.880 So he says, let me fix this vacuum cleaner. They say, 0:21:33.920 --> 0:21:37.119 that's fine. He saw that the vacuum cleaner had a 0:21:37.160 --> 0:21:40.360 couple of different motors, and one of which he used 0:21:40.359 --> 0:21:42.840 to repair and actually make, you know, pass it off 0:21:42.880 --> 0:21:45.680 as a working vacuum cleaner. And then he just took 0:21:45.720 --> 0:21:48.040 that other one, and that meant that they could make 0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:51.760 a drill that was even more powerful than the other one. Yeah. Um, 0:21:51.840 --> 0:21:55.960 so they had not one, but two electric drills um 0:21:56.000 --> 0:21:57.920 at their disposal, which kind of gives you a pretty 0:21:57.920 --> 0:22:01.200 good idea of just how dedicated and smart and crafty 0:22:01.280 --> 0:22:05.159 these guys were, right Yes, um. They also very famously 0:22:05.400 --> 0:22:10.160 ended up with fifty five zero different raincoats that were 0:22:10.200 --> 0:22:12.719 made from rubber prison issue raincoats, so they got from 0:22:12.760 --> 0:22:15.399 other inmates. And this really reveals something that I think 0:22:15.440 --> 0:22:18.440