Prisoners washing at a labor camp in the Malibu canyons, Malibu, 1921

Title: Prisoners washing at a labor camp in the Malibu canyons, Malibu, 1921
Date Created: [circa May 14, 1921]
Date: 1921-05-14
Publisher: Los Angeles Times
Language: No linguistic content
Collection: Los Angeles Times Photographic Collection

Description: This photograph appears with the article, “Crowded Jail Forces Prisoners Into Open,” Los Angeles Times, 15 May 1921: II1.
Due to overcrowding in the Los Angeles County Jail, a labor camp was opened in the canyons of Malibu where prison labor was used to build roads connecting to the Pacific Coast Highway. The open-air camp was noted for its lack of chains, steel bars, or handcuffs.
A row of men are seen washing themselves and their clothes. One man in the foreground chops wood.
Caption: Text from newspaper caption: Everybody his own “washer woman” Scrubbing up after a day on the roads.
Text from negative sleeve: Chain Gangs

Genre: cellulose nitrate film
news photographs
Location: Malibu (Calif.)
Resource type: still image
Subjects: Canyons--California--Malibu
Convict labor--California--Malibu
Prisoners--California--Malibu

Repository: University of California, Los Angeles. Library. Department of Special Collections
Local Identifier: uclamss_1429_1549
ARK: ark:/21198/zz002dc1jr
Manifest url

Rights statement: copyrighted
Rights Holder: UCLA Charles E. Young Research Library Department of Special Collections, A1713 Young Research Library, Box 951575, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575. E-mail: spec-coll@library.ucla.edu. Phone: (310)825-4988
Rights Country: US
Funding Note: Access to this collection is generously supported by Haynes Foundation funds.
Access to this collection is generously supported by Arcadia funds.
License: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License .