The Inside Out Prison The Story Of Beaver Creek Minimum Security Institution

The Inside Out Prison is the true story of a bold, low-cost "correctional experiment" begun in 1961 to make Canadians safer. Beaver Creek Correctional Camp, housed in a former Commonwealth air training base with no fences or weapons, would grow into Beaver Creek Institution, a minimum-security prison housing more than 200 inmates, 30 percent of whom would be lifers. The most important part of this history is how the staff, the community residents, and volunteers gave inmates an opportunity to change their lives. This symbiotic relationship between Corrections Canada and Muskoka epitomized the best of Canadian corrections, in the opinion of the author, who was the last indeterminate warden of this minimum-security prison facility. Charles Stickel captures the colourful dynamics between the staff and inmates and residents of the Gravenhurst area. His book is full of stories peppered with humour, which illustrate how a small number of staff effectively controlled a large number of inmates in a caring, practical, and meaningful way. It is a must read for those contemplating a career in corrections; plus an easy, enjoyable and funny read for the public, offering amazing insights into the valuable role a minimum-security institution can play in returning offenders successfully to the community. --Oliver Doyle, Professor, Sir Sandford Fleming College Detailed and thorough, The Inside Out Prison brings to light an often-forgotten period of correctional innovation, when minimum security camps like Beaver Creek were opened far removed from the old, walled penitentiaries that typify prisons to most Canadians. Little has been written about these institutions, so this well-researched book is an important step in broadening our collective understanding. It is refreshing to read a book about a prison that focuses not on notoriety, escapes, and violence but on the difficult work, perseverance, trust, and community support that made Beaver Creek unique. --Cameron Willis, Researcher and Operations Supervisor, Canada's Penitentiary Museum Charles Stickel has written a very readable book that provides a rare look at corrections history at Beaver Creek, likely unfamiliar to most. Having had hundreds of civilian-escorted inmates at our church services in the past, I read this book with great interest. --Peter Ryttersgaard, Pastor

Barry Avrich — a self-made, Montreal-born film producer/director, flamboyant advertising executive, and legendary biographer and connector of moguls and stars. For over three decades, he has relentlessly produced films on some of the most notorious show-business titans and also found the time to market and promote feature films, concerts, and the biggest shows on Broadway. In his memoir, Moguls, Monsters, and Madmen, Barry takes readers from his early days, shaping his brand as a creative adman with the infamous Garth Drabinsky and witnessing the genius of legendary Rolling Stones promoter Michael Cohl, to his acclaimed documentaries on Harvey Weinstein, Lew Wasserman, Bob Guccione, and many others. Go behind the scenes on his most provocative films — like The Last Mogul, Unauthorized, and Filthy Gorgeous — and follow Barry as he moves from the power rooms of Hollywood to the launches of incredible brands while hanging around with royalty, rogues, clients, and confidants. An extraordinary raconteur, Barry spares no one, least of all himself, as he details his extraordinary relationships and encounters with everyone from Frank Sinatra, Quincy Jones, and Vanity Fair columnist Dominick Dunne to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Moguls, Monsters and Madmen is a sharp and witty exposŽ of show business and notorious characters.

A daring journalist goes behind bars to explore the redemptive power of books with bikers, bank robbers, and gunmen An attack in London left Ann Walmsley unable to walk alone down the street, and shook her belief in the fundamental goodness of people. A few years later, when a friend asked her to participate in a bold new venture in a men's medium security prison, Ann had to weigh her curiosity and desire to be of service against her anxiety and fear. But she signed on, and for eighteen months went to a remote building at Collins Bay, meeting a group of heavily tattooed book club members without the presence of guards or security cameras. There was no wine and cheese, no plush furnishings. But a book club on the inside proved to be a place to share ideas and regain a sense of humanity. For the men, the books were rare prized possessions, and the meetings were an oasis of safety and a respite from isolation in an otherwise hostile environment. Having been judged themselves, they were quick to make judgments about the books they read. As they discussed the obstacles the characters faced, they revealed glimpses of their own struggles that were devastating and comic. From The Grapes of Wrath to The Cellist of Sarajevo, Outliers to Infidel, the book discussions became a springboard for frank conversations about loss, anger, redemption, and loneliness. The Prison Book Club follows six of the book club members, who kept journals at Walmsley's request and participated in candid one-on-one conversations. Graham the biker, Frank the gunman, Ben and Dread the drug dealers, and the robber duo Gaston and Peter come to life as the author reconciles her knowledge of their crimes with the individuals themselves, and follows their lives as they leave prison. And woven throughout is the determined and compassionate Carol Finlay, working tirelessly to expand her program across Canada and into the United States. The books changed the men and the men changed Walmsley, allowing her to move beyond her position as a victim. Given the choice, she'd forsake the company of privileged friends and their comfortable book club to make the two-hour drive to Collins Bay.

The American prison system has grown tenfold in thirty years, while crime rates have been relatively flat: 2 million people are behind bars on any given day, more prisoners than in any other country in the world — half a million more than in Communist China, and the largest prison expansion the world has ever known. In Going Up The River, Joseph Hallinan gets to the heart of America’s biggest growth industry, a self-perpetuating prison-industrial complex that has become entrenched without public awareness, much less voter consent. He answers, in an extraordinary way, the essential question: What, in human terms, is the price we pay? He has looked for answers to that question in every corner of the “prison nation,” a world far off the media grid — the America of struggling towns and cities left behind by the information age and desperate for jobs and money. Hallinan shows why the more prisons we build, the more prisoners we create, placating everyone at the expense of the voiceless prisoners, who together make up one of the largest migrations in our nation’s history.

This is the Final Report of Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission and its six-year investigation of the residential school system for Aboriginal youth and the legacy of these schools. This report, the summary volume, includes the history of residential schools, the legacy of that school system, and the full text of the Commission's 94 recommendations for action to address that legacy. This report lays bare a part of Canada's history that until recently was little-known to most non-Aboriginal Canadians. The Commission discusses the logic of the colonization of Canada's territories, and why and how policy and practice developed to end the existence of distinct societies of Aboriginal peoples. Using brief excerpts from the powerful testimony heard from Survivors, this report documents the residential school system which forced children into institutions where they were forbidden to speak their language, required to discard their clothing in favour of institutional wear, given inadequate food, housed in inferior and fire-prone buildings, required to work when they should have been studying, and subjected to emotional, psychological and often physical abuse. In this setting, cruel punishments were all too common, as was sexual abuse. More than 30,000 Survivors have been compensated financially by the Government of Canada for their experiences in residential schools, but the legacy of this experience is ongoing today. This report explains the links to high rates of Aboriginal children being taken from their families, abuse of drugs and alcohol, and high rates of suicide. The report documents the drastic decline in the presence of Aboriginal languages, even as Survivors and others work to maintain their distinctive cultures, traditions, and governance. The report offers 94 calls to action on the part of governments, churches, public institutions and non-Aboriginal Canadians as a path to meaningful reconciliation of Canada today with Aboriginal citizens. Even though the historical experience of residential schools constituted an act of cultural genocide by Canadian government authorities, the United Nation's declaration of the rights of aboriginal peoples and the specific recommendations of the Commission offer a path to move from apology for these events to true reconciliation that can be embraced by all Canadians.