Alcatraz

Opened mainly as a publicity stunt to show the country that the government was tought on crime, Alcatraz proved to be a financial disaster. Housing an inmate on the island carried the same price tag as a night at New York’s Waldorf Astoria hotel. It became the prison of choice for serious offenders for a simple reason -‘the Rock’ was believed to be escape-proof, until the Anglin brothers and Frank Morris floated away in a raft they made in 1962 and were never seen again. That enigmatic escape was made famous by the 1979 movie “Escape from Alcatraz”, starring Clint Eastwood.