Fort Leavenworth — The First Federal Prisons

After Congress established the Department of Justice (DOJ) in 1870, the position of "general agent" was created. Eventually, it evolves into the "superintendent of prisons," a person in charge of all federal prisoners. At the dawn of this era, convicts are primarily housed in local and state correctional facilities. After the Civil War, penal institutions grow increasingly crowded. With their resources overextended, they are therefore more reluctant to accept inmates who have been sentenced in federal courts. On March 3, 1891, Congress passes a law allowing for the construction of three penitentiaries, realizing a federal prison system for the first time. The DOJ acquires an old military prison at a fort in eastern Kansas, and in 1895 Fort Leavenworth becomes the first federal penal institution. The Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, the second such facility, opens in Georgia in 1902. The third federal site, on McNeil Island of the coast of Washington State, is constructed from a territorial jail and designated a federal penitentiary in 1907. These three institutions are the only federal prisons until 1925.

Warden Palmer and Staff. McNeil Island Penitentiary ca.1890, National Archives