Historic Findings Useful for the Museum
One of the components that Growing Change is going to add to the museum is some history of North Carolina's prisons.
Prisoners were used for labor and large transportation projects (constructing railways and highways). This was important for the transportation of cash crops in North Carolina, being a large agricultural state. North Carolina would also lease their prisoners to make money for the state, a program that was ended in 1931.
Men were arrested for petty crimes such as vagrancy and theft just to be used for their labor. Conditions in prisons were dismal. Many prisoners sent complaints to the State Board of Charities and Public Welfare telling of their living conditions. Convicts were beaten, underfed, could only get water once a day and many were forced to work on the roads during bad weather and became sick.
