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Angola (also known as "The Farm") is the '''Louisiana State Penitentiary''' and is estimated to be one of the largest Prison s in the U.S. with 5,000 inmates and over 1,000 staff. Located on an 18,000 acre (73 km&2) plantation in West Feliciana Parish close to the Mississippi border, it is surrounded on three sides by the Mississippi River , making flooding a constant menace. HISTORY The land that has become Angola Penitentiary was purchased by . The State of Louisiana only assumed full control in 1901 . In 1916 to save money, all the guards were fired, and selected inmates were used as trustees, a system which led to a great deal of abuse. www.burkfoster.com "Major James and the Origins of Modern Corrections in Louisiana" By the '' doaskdotell.com "DOASKDOTELL MOVIE REVIEWs of Monster’s Ball" were partly filmed in Angola. TODAY Indeed, Angola is still run as a working farm, and Cain once said that the key to running a peaceful maximum security prison was that "you've got to keep the inmates working all day so they're tired at night." The prison hosts a , " Gruesome Gertie ", last used for the execution of Andrew Lee Jones on 22 July 1991 . It has been noted that because of the large number of prisoners serving very long sentences, of every six men who enter the penitentiary, only one lives to walk out. The oldest man at Angola State Prison is 89 year old Walter Culbreath . MISC Angola is also the place of confinement of the Angola 3 , one of whom was freed in 2001 after 30 years in solitary and two of whom have been in solitary confinement for 35 years, a form of punishment to which the Eighth Amendment is not considered to apply.12 MUSICAL REFERENCES The prison has held many musicians and been the subject of a number of songs. Blues singer Leadbelly and Tex-Mex artist Freddy Fender were both pardoned from there. The song "Grown So Ugly" by American blues musician and ex-convict Robert Pete Williams references Angola. The song's lyrics have some basis in fact, as Williams was imprisoned there and was officially pardoned (from a murder charge) in 1964, the year the song says that he left the prison. The New Orleans classic song, "Junco Partner" includes the lines: :Six months ain't no sentence, and a year ain't no time :They got boys down in Angola doin' one year to ninety-nine Aaron and Charles Neville wrote "Angola Bound": :I got lucky last summer when I got my time, Angola bound :Well my partner got a hundred, I got ninety-nine, Angola bound :You been a long time coming but you're welcome home, Angola bound :And go to Louisiana get your burdens on, Angola bound :Oh Captain, oh Captain don't you be so cruel, Angola bound :Oh you work me harder than you work that mule, Angola bound Angola also features in the Neville Brothers song "Sons and Daughters" on the album "Brother's Keeper." Folklorist Frederick Oster recorded ''Angola Prison Worksongs'' for his Folklyric Records in 1959, now re-released on Arhoolie Records . According to Oster, between 1929 and 1940, 10,000 floggings were carried out in Angola. Singer Gil Scott-Heron wrote and recorded the song "Angola, Louisiana" on his 1978 album with Brian Jackson (keyboardist) "Secrets." The song deals with the inprisonment of inmate Gary Tyler . Singer-songwriter Myshkin recorded ''Angola'' in 1998 for her album ''Blue Gold''. The song suggests strongly at the case of former Angola warden C. Murray Henderson who was sentenced to 50 years in Angola prison for the attempted murder of his wife, writer Anne Butler: :Release me from this life I will seek my punishment :On the other side but the judge said :"Warden in cold blood you shot your poor poor wife :You're going back to Angola, there your hell to find" New Orleans Rap Artist Juvenile has part of a verse in the Hot Boys Song " Dirty World " that says: :They'll plant dope on ya, go to court on ya :Give ya 99 years and slam the door on ya :Angola, the free man bout it, he don't play :Nigga get outta line, ship 'em to Camp J Parchman Farm , a Mississippi Prison Farm has a similar legacy. James Booker , New Orleans pianist, in his cover of Goodnight, Irene mentions Angola prison; he was a resident there for heroin possession at the same time as famous Blues singer Lead Belly , as he describes in the song: :Lead Belly and little Booker both, had the pleasure of partying,
:Yeah, on the pon de rosa, you know, down in Angola :where they have boys doing from one year to ninety nine New Orleans rap group Bottom Posse recorded a song entitled "Angola Bound" that is unrelated to the Neville Brothers song of the same name. REFERENCES AND FOOTNOTES BOOKS ABOUT ANGOLA
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