Old Joliet Prison

The story

Construction of the Illinois State Penitentiary at Joliet began in 1858, carried out by convict labor from the prison at Alton, using limestone cut on the spot. Alton sent an initial group of 33 inmates in May 1858, and the transfers ended in July 1860. Criminals and prisoners of war were both held there during the Civil War (Wikipedia). In May 1864 Joseph Clark became the first officer killed there. By 1872 it held 1,239 inmates, which Wikipedia calls a record for a single prison. The Daily Cairo Bulletin of 13 February 1884 printed the line “The warden of the Joliet penitentiary reports 1,348 convicts on hand January 1, 1884” (a scanned text with OCR, so the figures are not certain).

Separate cells for women were built in 1896, and women were transferred elsewhere in 1933. The prison’s chronology includes Leopold and Loeb, sentenced to life in 1924. In March 1925 Stateville prison opened. In the late 1960s hepatitis experiments were carried out on conscientious objectors held there, and in 1975 a hostage-taking took place. The prison appears in the 1980 film The Blues Brothers, and in Prison Break and other productions. It closed in 2002 (Wikipedia and the Joliet Area Historical Museum). Guided tours began in 2018. On 25 September 2023 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a district with 31 contributing buildings, with the nomination supported by a $35,000 National Park Service grant awarded in 2021.

The legend

The oldest ghost story we found attached to the prison dates from July 1932, and it concerns its burial ground rather than the cell blocks. A United Press report, printed on 27 July 1932 by the Indianapolis Times and the Waterbury Democrat (scanned text with OCR errors), says Sheriff Oliver Flint and 75 posse men waited in vain in the convict graveyard for a white-shrouded figure that neighbors said wandered among the graves singing “Rock of Ages.” The sheriff blamed the wind; two neighbors insisted they had heard it. Ursula Bielski, writing in 2020, says crowds of up to 5,000 a night came and that police and prison officials later blamed an inmate’s singing; we have only her word for those details. One 1907 item, “Haunted House Is Sold” (Forrest City Times, 11 October 1907), concerns a Chicago house linked to Luetgert, who died at Joliet: “Even after Luetgert died at Joliet penitentiary no one could be found who wanted to live In the house.” That is a haunted-house story about a different building, not a prison ghost.

The accounts of ghosts inside the prison that we found begin in 2018, when ABC7 Chicago reported ghost tours there in October. WBEZ’s Curious City (29 October 2024) tells how a guest on an October 2018 tour photographed a hazy image of what appeared to be a woman in white in the prison yard, and how the guide, Larry Arroyo, thought of Odette Maizee Allen, a warden’s wife killed in 1915. WBEZ says a prisoner, Joe Campbell, was found guilty of her murder and his death sentence was reduced to life, and that the guide doubts the verdict. We have not checked this against records from 1915, and we found no earlier record of a ghost named Allen. That is the main thing we could not establish.

The museum itself keeps its distance. In the WBEZ piece Steven Wright of the museum says he has never seen or felt anything himself, and the museum does not want to encourage the idea of prisons as entertainment. A January 2022 episode of Ghost Hunters, titled “The Lost Souls of Joliet,” sent a team to investigate, according to Wikipedia’s episode listing. The prison’s history is heavy. The ghost stories from inside its walls are recent, while the singing ghost of its graveyard is some ninety years old.

What remains today

The prison is a closed state facility turned heritage site. WBEZ says the property belongs to the city of Joliet and that the Joliet Area Historical Museum manages the tours, and the museum’s own page says it offers them. The 2023 listing covers a historic district of 31 contributing buildings. Be careful not to confuse the prison with the staged haunted house across the street, which is a separate attraction.

Visiting

The museum’s page says self-guided and guided history tours are available seasonally, and ABC7 reported ghost tours in 2018. Schedules, prices and which areas are open change, so check with the Joliet Area Historical Museum before planning a visit. Men and women served sentences here, and people died here, so please treat the site with respect. We give no street address.

Sources

1. Wikimedia Commons category : Joliet Correctional Center — Wikimedia Commons
2. USGS 1:250000-scale Quadrangle for Aurora, IL 1958 — U.S. Geological Survey, 1958 · Public domain (USGS)
3. USGS 1:62500-scale Quadrangle for Joliet, IL 1892 — U.S. Geological Survey, 1892 · Public domain (USGS)
4. Illinois State Penitentiary-Joliet Historic District — History Pointer (NRIS data)
5. Joliet awarded National Park Service grant for Old Joliet Prison — Office of Rep. Bill Foster, 2021-09-01
6. List of Ghost Hunters episodes — Wikipedia
7. Old Joliet Prison — Joliet Area Historical Museum
8. Old Joliet Prison ghost tours take visitors to scariest parts of infamous jail — ABC7 Chicago, 2018-10-24
9. The Haunting of Joliet Prison: The Prison Cemeteries — American Ghost Walks (Ursula Bielski), 2020-08-16
10. Who, or what, haunts Old Joliet Prison? — WBEZ Curious City, 2024-10-29
11. Wikipedia article — Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Text written by AI from the sources above and checked by a separate AI fact-check (how we work). Images: credits and licenses under each picture.