The Big House

An inside-the-walls look at the bloody story of Folsom Prison, which opened in 1880, experiencing the first of many escapes the same year. Designed for habitual felons and incorrigibles doing hard time, its violent history includes 93 hangings.

Upon opening in rural New York State, Attica was hailed as an architectural landmark and model for the confinement of the most dangerous criminals.

McNeil Island, an isolated fortress rising from Puget Sound's chilly waters 40 miles south of Seattle, has been the scene of daring escapes and intense violence and home to train robbers, gangsters, and even politicians.

Most of Angola's 5,000 maximum-security inmates will never see the outside world again. Formerly a slave plantation in a remote area of Louisiana, in the 1930s Angola remained backward and brutal and by 1975.

Built in 1932, the federal penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, looks more like a church than a prison. When it opened, it was considered the most modern and humane prison in America.

The Florida State Prison at Raiford was built on 18,000 acres of farmland in 1913. The original maximum-security housing unit, nicknamed "The Rock", gave the prison its notorious reputation.

Located near Belfast, Maze Prison holds both Catholic and Protestant prisoners, members of paramilitary groups like the Irish Republican Army. The prison consists of 8 H-shaped cellblocks with cameras, searchlights, 16-foot walls, and guard towers.

The State Penitentiary in Auburn, New York is the centerpiece of a city and a monument to one of America's first attempts at criminal rehabilitation.

State Prison, Parchman, Mississippi, a land without visible boundaries. Originally a slave plantation ruled by the whip, today its most important crop is neither food nor cotton, but prisoners. And 75 percent of them are African American.

Called the "Castle on the Cumberland", its inspiring medieval presence is a focal point on the landscape.

The largest prison system in the free world, its 20,000 male and female inmates reflect the crimes and racial tensions of Los Angeles County. The challenge is staggering--feed 75,000 meals a day and keep 16,000 gang members from killing each other!

Take a behind-bars visit to America's first federal prison. In operation since 1895, Leavenworth has been home to infamous inmates, exciting escapes, and bloody riots.