Alcatraz Island Gardens’ Reconstruction Project Supported by a Save America’s Treasures Grant
Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy
San Francisco Bay, California
Year of Award: 2006
Federal Amount: $305,000
Matching Amount: $399,473
“The hillside provided a refuge from disturbances of the prison, the work a release, and it became an obsession. This one thing I would do well.” Elliot Michener, Inmate
Alcatraz Island has served as an army fortress in the 1800’s, a military prison from approximately 1861-1933, and most notably as a Federal penitentiary from 1933-1963. A Save America’s Treasures grant awarded in 2006 assisted in the support of a three-year project to reconstruct Alcatraz’s once-flourishing gardens.
As early as the 1860’s, the military imported soil from the Presidio and Angel Island to create a more pleasant environment by adding gardens for those brought to the island by duty or sentence. By1865, Victorian-style gardens were established, and by the 1920’s, hundreds of trees and shrubs had been planted by prisoners to continue the beautification effort.
In 1933, Alcatraz came under the control of the federal Bureau of Prisons. The job of caring for the gardens established by the Army fell to Fred Reichel, secretary to the warden. At this time, the gardens consisted of the hillside terraces, rose garden, and greenhouse. Reichel, himself a dedicated gardener, convinced the warden to allow inmate participation in a gardening program. Through Reichel’s efforts and collaboration with California horticulturalists, plants suited to the island’s rocky and challenging climate were sought. With intensive soil preparation, planting, and maintenance, inmates turned the western slopes into a series of gardens that prisoners would pass through on their way to work. One inmate, Elliot Michener, a prisoner from 1941-1950, built the western terraces and constructed the tool shed.
When the Federal prison closed in 1963, maintenance of the gardens ceased, and walls, paths, steps, railings, plants, and garden areas began to deteriorate and were nearly lost. Plants that required constant maintenance disappeared, while more hardy species invaded and took over the general landscape. Many plants and species perished due to pests, drought and poor soil. Waterfowl also re-established colonies on the island. In 1972, Alcatraz Island became part of the National Park Service’s Golden Gate National Recreation Area, and was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1986. A plant inventory was conducted in 1993 that identified 230 different plant species, some of which proved to be quite historic and rare.
By 2003, after 40 years of obscurity, the Garden Conservancy, Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, and the National Park Service began a joint campaign to reconstruct the gardens. The Save America’s Treasures funds aided with reconstructing paths, retaining walls, and railings as well as with improving the soil and purchasing plants. Today, Alcatraz Island and its gardens are open to the public and visited annually by over 1.5 million guests.
Established in 1999, the Save America’s Treasures program is managed by the National Park Service, with the National Endowment Agencies, to preserve and protect nationally significant properties and collections for future generations of Americans. Stories of saving those treasures will be shared through partnership with the American Architecture Foundation.
Featured photo courtesy of the National Park Service.
