Crime and Punishment | Page 7

State Reformatory for Women, Shakopee

State Reformatory for Women, Shakopee, ca. 1937.

Higbee Hall

Higbee Hall, the administration building at the Women's State Reformatory, Shakopee, 1936. Photo by A. F. Raymond.

Incarcerated woman feeding pigs

A woman incarcerated at the Minnesota Reformatory for Women, Shakopee, feeds pigs in a field, ca. 1920.

Incarcerated women cultivating a field

Women incarcerated at the Minnesota Reformatory for Women, Shakopee, cultivate a field ca. 1920.

Incarcerated women posing by a cornfield

Women incarcerated at the Minnesota Reformatory for Women, Shakopee, pose by a cornfield, ca. 1920.

Minnesota Correctional Institution for Women, Shakopee

Minnesota Correctional Institution for Women, Shakopee, 1978. Photo by Stormi Greener for the Minneapolis Star Tribune; used with the permission of the Star Tribune.

Minnesota State Reformatory for Women, Shakopee

Minnesota Correctional Facility-Shakopee (MCF-Shakopee) is Minnesota’s only state women’s prison. Women reformers pushed for its existence in the 1910s, arguing that women needed a place away from men where they could receive training instead of punishment. It opened in 1920 as the State Reformatory for Women. Over the next hundred years, it became increasingly crowded, and its focus shifted from “retraining” its prisoners to confining them.

Arrest of Cecelia Regina Gonzaga, 1885

Cecelia Regina Gonzaga, an African American assigned a male sex at birth, lived in St. Paul for four weeks during the summer of 1885. After a police officer arrested her for wearing women’s clothes on August 20, he took her into custody and questioned her at the Ramsey County Courthouse. He released her later the same day, but Gonzaga quickly left the city by train and returned to St. Louis.

Key used at Minnesota State Prison, Stillwater

Key used at Minnesota Territorial Prison (later Minnesota State Prison), Stillwater. It has the number "5" stamped into its head; it opened a prison guard's gate, possibly Gate 5.

Aerial view of Minnesota State Prison, Stillwater

Aerial view of Minnesota State Prison, Stillwater, 1954. Photograph by Mary Kruskopf.

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