Alcatraz’s Cultural Legacy Extends Beyond Its Prison Past

The Trump administration is pushing to reopen Alcatraz as a federal prison, requiring the repeal of National Park protections and ending its six-decade transformation from America’s most notorious penitentiary into one of its most popular tourist sites. Throughout its long history, Alcatraz has served not only as a prison, but also as a military base, a site of Native American unity and resistance, a bird sanctuary, and a tourist site for 1.4 million of visitors who journey to it every year. Critics contend that the effort to convert it back into a prison is a wasteful folly. While others decry the loss of the site as a national park and museum, which offers a historical perspective into the American carceral system. We talk about the unique space that Alcatraz occupies in Bay Area cultural history, and its lasting legacy.