Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1874-10-27
LARGEST CITY CIRCULATION
THE CITY.
M IA MI HIS.
Tuesday Evening, October 27, 1877.
AN IMPROBABLE JAIL.

Something that Thieves Cannot
Break Through Even when Fur
Dished with burglars TOOIs-A
NewInventtOn suited TO the Times.
Many visitors to the Exposition have
seen in the Power Hall cast iron cell
window for jails and penitentiaries, the
invention of Messrs James B. Cook and
j. W. Heath, of our city. Mr.. James
B. Cook is a well known architect, who
has made jails study with a view to
the safe keeping of prisoners. This
Jail window is part of a patent taken
out in the United States Patent Office by
Mr. Cook and James W. Heath, who is a
well known foundryman in our city. 1t
is an invention that overturns all former
ideas of prisons, and it is one that will
strike every one with its usefulness and
adaptability to every city and county in
the South. A prison is a necessary
building in every section of country as
every section has its desperadoes and
criminals. Heretofore the old couplet
has been thoroughly understood by
prisoners:
Stone walls do not prison make
Nor iron bars cage"
And hence the repeated and oft
recurring escapes by professional
burglars and convicts. The old plan
was to use wrought iron barred windows
and doors. The professionals easily saw
these bars in two with watch spring
saw or one made ont of fine steel knife
blade, and they are often wrenched cut
by burglars instruments, which are
struggled in by outside friends. These
iron bars then become deadly weapons
and great aids to the escaping prisoners.
The cast iron window and door of
Messrs. Cook and Heath defy all the
efforts of the prisoners; they can neither
be sawed in twain, broken or wrenched
of, it being a solid piece of casting.
HOW THE JAIL is BUILT.
Formerly the Jail builders commenced
from the outside by putting up the stone
or brick walls, then the wrought iron
windows and doors and the cells; so it
was easy for the prisoners to dig through
the wall or escape by the windows, and
they could be helped by outsiders, but
the new plan does away with all this,
rendering it impossible for the
prisoner to get out, no matter
what tools he may have to work with,
and rendering it quite as nearly impos'
sible for any persons outside to render
any assistance. Architect Cook first
puts up his strong cells entirely
of cast iron, top, bottom and sides.
The iron plates forming these
cells are united by lap or tongue and
grooved joints. These cells are sup
ported externally by wooden bulkhead'
ing, jointed in the same manner, and
then come the outside brick or stone
walls. The window frames and sash
are of cast iron, with geometrieal per-
forations to admit light and air. The
doors and door frames are also of cast
iron, so that the method of construction
by first putting the iron work in posi-
ton, then the bulkheads and lastly the
outer WSlls against the bulkheading, is
to build from within outwardly, render
ing the Jail impregnabls. In order to
break out the iron work OF these cells,
the oDtside wall must first be torn down,
then the bnlkheading, and then the
plates; working from within being rem
dered AZ impossibility by the system Of
dove-tailing and tongue and groove
joints.
THESE JAILs SHOULD BE EVERYWHERE.
Messrs. Cook and Heath have built
several of these jails-one at Sardis,
Mississippi, from, which the most desper'
ate Jail birds have been unable to es-
cape, after repeated desperate attempts.
They are about to construct another at
fernando, Mississippi, aud others at
different points. One of the great ad-
vantages Of these jails, outside Of their
impregnability, is their cheapness, the
old plan costing from twenty to thirty
thousand dollars, and the new plan from
ten to twelve thousand dollars, showing
a superior chespness both in manufac-
ture and application. The plan is sus.
centihle of enlaryemeut in fact. anv