Christmas 2012 - - David was very puzzled that I wanted to get out and "visit things" in Philly on the day after Thanksgiving. The Barnes Collection was booked solid so we went to the equally famous North Eastern Penitentiary (now fortunately no longer in use).

It was active from about 1830 to 1970 and was initially built to accommodate what was known as the Philadelphia method of treatment of criminals. This involved total isolation for the term of the sentence - they never met another prisoner, hardly saw the guards, were hooded to be transferred from building to building and were threatened with terrible punishment if they tried to talk. The idea was that they should contemplate their wickedness and so repent.

This idiocy was not abandoned till about 1920 when the New York method was adopted so allowing prisoners to exercise and to do some useful work.