American Prison: A Reporter’s Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment

After most states abolished convict leasing, they found a new system of forced labor: the chain gang. By 1910, with the increase in automobile use, convict labor was put to a new use: upgrading old roads and building new ones. The cost to the state was less than half that of free labor. Progressives who advocated this new form of labor argued that it built character and “prepared them for better citizenship” (197). Newspapers claimed that road work improved inmates’ health and well-being. In reality, however, conditions for the prisoners did not improve, as one county official in North Carolina reported that “the mules at the camp were better housed and better treated in every way than the convicts” (198). Convicts were chained together, sometimes resulting in death when, for example, they could not escape a fire. Whippings, sweatboxes, and other forms of punishment were still common; and, as usual, the inmates who suffered the most under this new system were Black.

After being told that many inmates think he’s gay, Bauer begins working out and trying to “annihilate anything remotely feminine about me” (201). He modifies his inmate counting method as well as his stride, trying to “look tough.