A Warden's tale of sacrifice and strength.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Phillip Parker does an amazing job of shining a light on people and their sacrifices where there is no glory or applause.
--Anita G.
Guard
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<h1 class="element-title case-upper">ONE</h1>
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<h2 id="subhead-1" class="section-title subhead keep-with-next paragraph-follows case-upper">FINDING MY FOOTING</h2>
<p class="first first-in-chapter first-full-width first-after-subhead"><span class="first-phrase">I grew</span> up about two miles from Possum Trot, a rural community in Western Kentucky. I was a shy, awkward kid who was not particularly good at sports, nor was I a good student. I was average at best. I didn’t have a lot of friends in school. I just tried to blend in. It was 1970 when I graduated from North Marshall High School. Most of us were just hanging out waiting to see if we would be drafted. My first job out of high school was as a riverboat deckhand. It was good money, but it wasn’t for me. In fact, the job was not the adventure I thought it would be. It wasn’t long before I decided I needed to do something else with my life just in case I wasn’t drafted. I enrolled in a community college where I had to really study and apply myself just to make average grades. I guess this was because I had not learned much in high school.</p>
<p class="subsq">After two years in community college, I enrolled in Murray State University, where I earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology. I attended one year of graduate school, but I was burned out. I was tired of being so poor and living on student loans. When I finally got my draft notice, I went for my physical and was turned down because I had flat feet.</p>
<p class="subsq">Probably the biggest influence in my life was my practice of Karate while I was in college. I had a knack for it. I would practice every day for hours. I became obsessed. When I earned my black belt in Wado Ryu–style Karate, I started entering tournaments. One of my instructors was Sensei Vic Milner. I became an instructor and taught Karate at the university. I also taught in several local Dojos. I had won tournaments in the black belt division in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Arkansas. I only lost two times, once in a full-contact event in Alabama and once in a “Battle of Champions.” Some of my students were guards and supervisors from KSP. I had a standing offer as a guard if I ever needed a job.</p>
<p class="subsq">I graduated from college in the Jimmy Carter years while the economy was stalled. There were no jobs. Finally, I decided to give the prison a try. What did I have to lose? I didn’t have any other prospects for a job unless I wanted to go back on a riverboat or go back to graduate school. So I applied for the job and was hired as a correctional officer. I never looked back.</p>
<h2 id="subhead-2" class="section-title subhead keep-with-next paragraph-follows case-upper">THE BELLY OF THE BEAST</h2>
<p class="first first-after-subhead">My first day at KSP (Kentucky State Prison) was July 3, 1978. And I was nervous. As I rounded the curve and drove down the road from Pea Ridge, there it was, looming like a medieval fortress on the banks of Lake Barkley. The Castle on the Cumberland River. What had I gotten myself into? I could only imagine what convicted inmates might think when they see the Castle for the first time. The prison itself resembles something out of the Middle Ages, with its soaring walls, stone parapets, and heavily guarded watchtowers. An imposing place, with a reputation to match.</p>
<p class="subsq">As I started up the crumbling steps to the main entrance, I heard a grumpy voice say, “HALT! State your business.” I stopped dead in my tracks. The command to halt sounded threatening—as if I might be shot if I didn’t obey.</p>
<p class="subsq">I looked up and saw a middle-aged man peering down at me from the gun tower. I responded, “I am Philip Parker, and I am reporting to work.”</p>
<p class="subsq">“Go ahead,” was all he said. I didn’t know what to think about this first encounter, but I knew I was about to enter a strange, new world.</p>
<p class="subsq">As I approached the front gate, I stepped aside as several uniformed men with shotguns came running from the armory located at just off the top of the steps. Startled, I stepped aside and froze as they passed. I thought to myself, <i>What in the hell is this about?</i></p>
<p class="subsq">I learned later that there had been a mass escape from Four Cell House. My very first day. Three inmates, Joe Craig, James Hatfield, and Charles Murphy, had cut through their cell bars and made their way down the short distance from the opening to the ground using bedsheets fashioned into a braided rope. As with every prison escape, their luck was fleeting; the men were apprehended a few days later. As first impressions go, this was a lot to take in for a new corrections officer.</p>
<p class="subsq">I stood at the entrance, waiting to be ushered in. There was no control center at the time to automatically open prison doors. After the front gate officer keyed the lock, I crossed the threshold and entered the belly of the beast. One of the things I never quite became accustomed to after all my years in the Castle was the smell. The Castle has an odor unlike anything I have ever experienced: an ungodly combination of cigarette smoke, body odor, sewer gas, death, and history. It still smells that way to me. Some five decades later, I still notice that odor as I walk up to the prison gates. Half-jokingly, I always say it is the smell of the Castle Beast, the one that trolls the front entrance, taunting all those who sense its presence.</p>
<p class="subsq">After filling out employment paperwork with two other new hires, we were told to go to the receiver’s basement to get our uniforms. I thought to myself, <i>What the hell is the receiver’s basement?</i> Turns out it was a warehouse in the basement of Five Cell House with an outside entrance. I learned my first lesson on the job: prison workers have their own language to describe the Castle’s twisty, cavernous interior. I knew we had to learn fast or we would not find our way around. KSP is enormous, with five large cell blocks that housed 1,200 inmates in 1978. In subsequent years, two new cell blocks were added, even as the overall population decreased to around 980, because inmates no longer shared cells.</p>
<p class="subsq">With uniforms in hand, the new hires were directed to report to the hospital for a physical. The hospital, I later learned, was a state-licensed facility complete with infirmary beds, a surgical wing, a pharmacy, and an emergency room. But we had no idea how to get there. After wandering around the sprawling prison yard for what seemed like an eternity, one of the older guards took pity on us and pointed to where we had to go.</p>
<p class="subsq">A man in a lab coat with a stethoscope led me into an exam room and asked some standard questions about my health. I filled out a medical history as he listened to my heart and lungs, took my blood pressure, pulse, and temperature. I thought he was a doctor. Several weeks later, I saw him in the canteen line and realized the man I mistook for a doctor was actually a convict.</p>
<h2 id="subhead-3" class="section-title subhead keep-with-next paragraph-follows case-upper">SOMETHING FISHY</h2>
<p class="first first-after-subhead">A “fish” is a term used to describe a newly hired officer or a new inmate who just got off the bus. Why, I don’t know. It is just prison slang. The “fish tank” was a row of cells in One Cell House used to house inmates until they had been given an orientation and a list of the rules. They would also meet the Classification Committee to be assigned a job and a cell.</p>
<p class="subsq">A fish <i>officer</i> is a new hire who has not attended the academy or learned the ropes. These rookie officers are basically useless and treated accordingly. You remained a fish officer until you became familiar with all the ins-and-outs of daily prison operations and earned a small degree of respect. You had to prove yourself, meaning you would not run from trouble and you would back up your fellow officers. You also had to follow orders to the letter.</p>
<p class="subsq">I was hired in with two middle-aged female employees, Betty Blackwell and Rosy Mitchell. In the late 1970s, only a handful of females were hired as correctional officers. It was still a man’s world, but that was rapidly changing for the better. Nora Aldridge was the first female hired as a correctional officer sometime around 1976. Soon after, Judy Groves was hired and had already made sergeant by the time I came aboard. I try to imagine how they must have felt entering such a hostile, male-dominated environment, where danger and violence were the norm. These were courageous and brave women.</p>
<p class="subsq">As the three of us made our way out to the receiver’s basement, we had to traverse a sidewalk just below Four Cell House then Five Cell House. Inmates could stand at the barred windows in the hallways of Five Cell House and look down at the walkway we were on, the cars in the parking lot, and the boat traffic on Lake Barkley. We were about to learn our next lesson.</p>
<p class="subsq">Betty Blackwell, walking next to me on the winding sidewalk, was a middle-aged blond with an attractive figure, and Rosie Mitchell, a middle-aged person of color, strode alongside Betty as we made our way to the receiver’s basement. As we passed under Five Cell House, we could hear a whistle and catcall from somewhere above us on one of the four floors of Five Cell House. “Shake it, baby, shake it!” I was street smart and did not look toward the direction of the voice. Betty reflexively glanced up, however, and that same voice yelled, “Not you, Bitch. HIM.” I thought, <i>Oh my God, they are talking to me!</i> Another lesson for a fish guard.</p>
<h2 id="subhead-4" class="section-title subhead keep-with-next paragraph-follows case-upper">TRAINING</h2>
<p class="first first-after-subhead">Training consisted of a two-week academy at Eastern Kentucky University, the training center for all correctional officers and police officers in Kentucky. After the academy, we endured a week of firearms training at KSP, followed by on-the-job training. Before could be scheduled for the academy, I had to shadow more experienced officers. I was not allowed to work by myself until I graduated from the academy.</p>
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A Life dedicated to order and justice.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Guard is an important read for anyone seeking insight into the inner workings of the prison employee experience.
--Dr. Norman R.