on the button 80 years ago today , Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary officially opened its gate to some of America ’s most violently incorrigible criminals — after all , it wasthe most escape - proof prison ever build . dodging - proof , that is , for everyone except three captive in 1962 and their trusty arsenal of brilliant , hacked - together widget .
While we ’re almost sure that Clarence Anglin , John Anglin , and Frank Morris did manage to choke the poky in history ’s most notorious escape attempt , no one has meet them since . The most potential ratiocination is that the three man submerge inthe icy water system while attempting to reach the mainland . But even if they never made it to dry land , the complexness and planning of the escape itself is a wonder to behold .
Here ’s everything they used to pull off one of the most insane escape in prison history .
A Drill
The Anglin Brothers and Frank Morris fabricated a exercise out of this vacancy clean motor . They used it to break holes in the walls of their cells .
viaUS Department of the Interior
A Wrench
For wrenching thing .
viaUs Department of the Interior
Shivs and Scrapers of All Sorts
This picture read the various tools and equipment the inmates fashioned from promptly available objects . The identifiable ones include : ( depressed center ) sharpen spoon handles used in penetrating cell walls ; ( center ) a motor remove from a vacuum cleaner cleaner and used as a Mandrillus leucophaeus ; ( top nerve center ) a lodging to fit over the vacuum cleaner clean motor to mute its noise during use ; ( upper properly ) pieces of electrical electric cord ; ( halfway leftover ) bolts with nut , shafts , and sleeves that may have been used to use pressure in fan out bars ; ( upper left ) two - cell torch made from two penlight batteries . The other particular come out to be tool for scraping , digging , cut , and gouging . All of these target had been discarded in a five - gallon paint bucket ( detect in the yardbird ’ workshop ) that had been filled with cementum in an effort to avoid protection .
viathe Federal Bureau of Investigations
A Spoon Key
Possibly using machine putz in one of the prison house workshops , an inmate carved the teeth of a winder into the hold of this spoonful . Officers had to keep cay covered with alloy sleeves , so that convict could not see and imitate their classifiable blueprint .
Camouflage Materials for Your Man-Sized Hole
These bottle contained the greenish paint that was used to paint wall sections and ventilator grilles in cells as part of 1962 escape program .
Throw in some careful cutting , and the cover of that binder turns into the mistaken ventilator grilles you see below .
Real Human Hair
The mat and little swatch of human tomentum shown here were situate under the bed of Clarence Anglin . Note the manner of tying the hair in swatches with fine train of thought , resulting in a “ ponytail ” effect , which enabled the inmates to paste the hair to the dummy heads in an overlapping mode to give the show of a lifelike head of hair .
Dummy Heads With Weaves from Real Human Hair
The Anglin Brothers , Frank Morris and Allen Clayton West made fake heads of cotton , soap and human hair . They placed the painted heads in their beds to enshroud their outflow .
get ’s say that one more clock time : real . human . hair .
viathe Federal Bureau of Investigation
A Periscope
While bring on their leak plan from the roof of their cell block , the inmates took turns keeping watch for the guards in the eve using this homemade periscope .
Remnants of the homemade periscope that was fabricated from canvas board , tape , and mirrors .
Escape Boat Instructions
The Anglin Brothers and Frank Morris confer this “ Popular Mechanics , ” for information on how to make the rubber raft that they used in their 1962 escape endeavour . The magazine was recovered from the cell .
Paddles
For — surprise surprise — paddling .
A Raft Made of Raincoats
A close - up view of a living preserver made by the inmates out of raincoat . The seams appear to be vulcanized , or sealed with the app of heat and insistence . The warmth was available from an exposed copper hot water pipe , and the pressure was applied with a large , heavy plank .
This mountain , constructed by the inmates out of raincoats , was apparently abandon as impractical . The [ bottom ] pic shows the wooden plug used as the valve to balloon the raft .
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