Jailhouse Stories

In the 1950s and '60s Neil Haugerud served as sheriff of Fillmore County in southeastern Minnesota. During this time, he and his wife and their four small children made their home in the building that housed the county jail. In Jailhouse Stories, Haugerud describes what it was like to live above a prison, where jailbirds and jailbreaks were part of family life. These are the reminiscences of a real-life Andy Griffith character, a man dedicated to maintaining order during both peaceful and turbulent days in rural America. Through the author we meet colorful characters on both sides of the law: for example, Doc Nehring, the county coroner, who uses dark humor to get through the grim duties of his job, and Irvin Johnson, who becomes the sheriff's friend despite his constant drinking and incarceration. Stories of domestic squabbles and infidelity are mixed with those of church functions and child rearing. Throughout the stories runs Haugerud's compassionate outlook on human nature. "I came to understand how people make a lot of mistakes, but in my view there are very few bad people, " he writes. The town where Haugerud lives is part Mayberry, part Twin Peaks. We get a glimpse into the lives of the town's citizens, whose problems range from the ordinary to the offbeat to the downright bizarre. In stories that are by turns heartwarming and sad, humorous and humane, Jailhouse Stories tells of the trials, tribulations, and pleasures of rural law enforcement during a bygone era.

Hangings, lynchings and jail breaks are long forgotten in Pacific County, where tourists flock to quaint attractions every season. But back in the early days, when the first jailhouse was built, this was a rough, rustic setting. Popular cannery worker Lum You was hanged here in 1902--the only legal execution in county history. Industrious smugglers and creative entrepreneurs outwitted state-sanctioned prohibition measures, though some still did time in the jailhouse. Historian Sydney Stevens presents a collection of tales culled from a forgotten prison record book. Opium fiends, thieves, military deserters and even wayward girls jailed for incorrigible acts are brought out of the shadows of a wilderness long gone.

“These recipes make me smile and laugh out loud with joy, memory, and awe at their total culinary genius. All born from a bond of pure hunger?”—Samuel L. Jackson, from the Foreword When you’re in prison, a little money in the commissary can mean the difference between a life of flavorless misery and the pleasure of re-creating a taste of childhood. And it starts with Ramen. Filled with contributions from anonymous inmates as well as names you’ll recognize, such as guitarist Slash and actors Danny Trejo, Taryn Manning, and Shia LaBeouf, Prison Ramen is an original collection of inspired Ramen hacks: Hit Man Burritos. Sloppy Ramen Joe. Onion Tortilla Ramen Soup. Shawshank Spread. And Orange Porkies: Chile ramen + white rice + 1 bag pork skins + orange-flavored punch. Firsthand stories of life in prison, told by each of the contributors, go a long way to explaining the joy of doctoring a bag of Ramen. A joy you can now re-create in the freedom of your own kitchen.

From James Patterson, the world's #1 bestselling author: a young lawyer takes on the judge who is destroying her hometown—and ends up in jail herself. In picture-perfect Erva, Alabama, the most serious crimes are misdemeanors. Speeding tickets. Shoplifting. Contempt of court. Then why is the jail so crowded? And why are so few prisoners released? There’s only one place to learn the truth behind these incriminating secrets. Sometimes the best education a lawyer can get is a short stretch of hard time.

This book is a story or series of stories about people. People in prison: some are employees, but most are inmates. This book is their story. In prison everyone has a story and most want to tell their story. The main problem is to get someone to listen. It is often a story of violence, a story of loneliness, and in many cases the horror of the unknown. This book is the result of countless hours of listening to story by story of hatred. Countless days (indeed years) about plans for that day when they get out. This book is the Boiling Down of the American version of Crime And Punishment. Hopefully someone will see a ray of hope in the human predicament called Crime.

A “profound, sometimes hilarious, often heartbreaking” (The New York Times) view of prison life, as told by currently and formerly incarcerated people, from the co-creators and co-hosts of the Peabody- and Pulitzer-nominated podcast Ear Hustle “A must-read for fans of the legendary podcast and all those who seek to understand crime, punishment, and mass incarceration in America.”—Piper Kerman, author of Orange Is the New Black When Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods met, Nigel was a photography professor volunteering with the Prison University Project and Earlonne was serving thirty-one years to life at California’s San Quentin State Prison. Initially drawn to each other by their shared interest in storytelling, neither had podcast production experience when they decided to enter Radiotopia’s contest for new shows . . . and won. Using the prize for seed money, Nigel and Earlonne launched Ear Hustle, named after the prison term for “eavesdropping.” It was the first podcast created and produced entirely within prison and would go on to be heard millions of times worldwide, garner Peabody and Pulitzer award nominations, and help earn Earlonne his freedom when his sentence was commuted in 2018. In This Is Ear Hustle, Nigel and Earlonne share their own stories of how they came to San Quentin, how they created their phenomenally popular podcast amid extreme limitations, and what has kept them collaborating season after season. They present new stories, all with the same insight, balance, and rapport that distinguish the podcast. In an era when more than two million people are incarcerated across the United States—a number that grows by 600,000 annually—Nigel and Earlonne explore the full and often surprising realities of prison life. With characteristic candor and humor, their moving portrayals include unexpected moments of self-discovery, unlikely alliances, inspirational resilience, and ingenious work-arounds. One personal narrative at a time, framed by Nigel’s and Earlonne’s distinct perspectives, This Is Ear Hustle reveals the complexity of life for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people while illuminating the shared experiences of humanity that unite us all.

A completely new, fresh, and frightening take on "prison literature."

This book is intended for researchers in the field of narrative from post-graduate level onwards. It analyzes the audio-recordings of the narratives of former slaves from the American South which are now publically available on the Library of Congress website: Voices from the days of slavery. More specifically, this book analyses the identity work of these former slaves and considers how these identities are related to master narratives. The novelty of this book is that through using such a temporally diverse and relatively large corpus, we show how master narratives change according to both the zeitgeist of the here-and-now of the interview world and the historical period that is related in the there-and-then of the story world. Moreover, focusing on the active achievement of master narratives as socially-situated co-constructed discursive accomplishments we analyze how different, inherently unstable and even contradictory versions of master narratives are enacted.