The Journal of Prison Discipline and Philanthropy (New Series, No. 50) November 1911Pennsylvania Prison Society
History
The Journal of Prison Discipline and Philanthropy (New Series, No. 50) November 1911
Pennsylvania Prison Society
Charities -- Periodicals; Prisons -- Periodicals
But work on the new building is not by any means the sole industrial
employment. The total number of days’ work of inmates is reported
as 171,952. The industries comprise broom and brush making, carpet
weaving, farming operations, wall building and domestic employments.
The revenue from brooms is estimated at $16,935.00; brushes, $2,062.00,
carpets, $4,610.00; boarding prisoners, $31,620.00; farm products,
$2,677.00.
The farm products of which the greater part was consumed on the
premises include 5,865 bushels potatoes, 1,550 bushels wheat, 424
bushels sweet corn, 1,058 bushels green beans, 1,313 bushels tomatoes,
30,025 heads cabbage, 8,000 heads celery, 1,252 pounds butter, 3,039
gallons milk, 200 chickens, 496 dozen eggs. The total number of days’
employment outside the walls was 28,857, and yet but one prisoner made
his escape.
Chaplain Imbrie reports that there is a Sabbath service in the prison
chapel, at which attendance is voluntary. “But few absent themselves
from this service.” They have a choir of their own, with an efficient
musical director. During the winter there are frequent entertainments
held in the chapel, consisting of lectures, elocution and music. They
have a judiciously selected library of 6,000 volumes, and the number
of books taken out during the year was 18,167.
They have a total enrollment in the night school of 185, with an
average attendance of about 176. This school is maintained largely for
the benefit of the illiterates and of those whose education has been
extremely limited. The difficulties of presenting statistics of those
who are permanently reformed is well illustrated by the following
extract from the chaplain’s report: “As the year closes I find myself
looking back and counting the meetings and partings with more than
four thousand souls, who have come and gone during the past twelve
months.... I have known each one for a few weeks or months, then they
have gone like the ships that pass in the night.... A few have written
kind letters to me after having reached their homes, a few have sent
messages, ... some I have met on the streets of the city, and a few
have been returned as prisoners to this institution, but the greater
number have been absorbed in the great mass of humanity, and I have
no further trace of them. The promises made at parting may be broken,
the influence of the few weeks spent here may soon be effaced by the
environments of the world, the seed sown in the gospel messages may
never mature, but yet the effort has been made, and the increase is
with the Father.”
CORRESPONDENCE.
MT. LEBANON PRISON, SYRIA.
... This prison is located in Bate-id-deen, where the governor-general
and all the government officials reside. There I had an interesting
call on the governor of Mt. Lebanon, Yusuf Pasha Kusa.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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