ALCATRAZ
By Lee Ann Flemming
Steve and I went to San Francisco to see my sister several years ago. One of our favorite tourist attractions was to visit ALCATRAZ. Last week I saw that the movie Escape from Alcatraz was on television. I took off a couple of hours from my housecleaning and clothes washing and watched the entire movie with a whole new viewpoint. How strange to see all the places that I had seen and walked through the same buildings where the movie was filmed. Clint Eastwood is one of my favorite actors and I was totally engrossed in the movie.
In the early 1930’s and 1940’s Alcatraz was the home for the country’s hardest criminals. It was known as “The Rock” and no one was able to escape from it. Some of our country’s most notorious criminals lived here, which helped to gain its notoriety.
As I toured the premises, I thought about the men like Al Capone, Machine Gun Kelly and the Bird Man of Alcatraz, who served their last days here. We walked their daily routines and took the same steps that they took on a daily basis. The cafeteria where they ate their meals and the yard where they spent their free time on the exercise yard, often in freezing weather, were on the tour that we took as visitors.
Many of the building are deteriorating, but some are still intact as they were many years ago. Even though some buildings are a shell of what they once were, there is still a feeling of history and an era of time gone by.
One thing that I had never really thought about was the children of Alcatraz. There were people who were employed as guards, cooks, and workmen who actually lived on the island. They had families who also lived there with them. They followed their own set of rules and regulations as inhabitants of the island. Each day they took the ferry to San Francisco to attend school. Every afternoon they took the ferry to return to their home on Alcatraz. Children of Alcatraz could never be kept after school because if they missed the ferry there was no way of getting home. Hopefully there were some very creative teachers who thought of other ways of punishment other than staying after school, if these children needed to be reprimanded. I read a book for young readers entitled Al Capone Does My Shirts. It is a work of historical fiction about a child who lived on Alcatraz. It is a great book for young readers.
We met a man named Darwin E. Coon who had written a book about his life when he was an inmate in the 1940’s. He signed our book and talked with us for a while. When the prison closed its doors, it was supposed to be a big news event with camera crews and reporters everywhere. The day before it closed, President Kennedy was assassinated and the closing of Alcatraz was news that paled in comparison.
Steve and I are not big on traveling. We are homebodies. When we do go places, we like to take in all the local sights and places of interest. I have been to countless numbers of alligator farms, even though we have alligators 5 miles away at our lakes on our farm. I’ve even stopped to see the largest ball of string.
Enjoy this week’s recipes. Thanks for reading.
BAKED HERB CHICKEN
1 cup water
1 Tbsp. chicken bouillon granules
¾ tsp. dried thyme
½ tsp. dried marjoram
¼ tsp. lemon pepper seasoning
1 broiler/fryer chicken ( 3-4 pounds)
1 pound red potatoes, halved
2 medium onions, cut into ½ inch pieces
2 cups baby fresh carrots
Combine water, bouillon, marjoram, thyme and lemon pepper and pour into a roasting pan. Add chicken; arrange potatoes, onions and carrots around it. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour, basting often. Uncover; bake for 30 minutes or until vegetables are tender and chicken juices run clear.
COCONUT CHERRY PIE DESSERT
1 ½ cups flour
¾ cup butter, softened
¾ cups chopped pecans
1 (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
1 cup powdered sugar
3 cups Cool Whip
2 small pkg. coconut pudding mix (instant), prepared as directed
1 can cherry pie filling
Toasted coconut
Mix flour, butter and pecans. Press into a 9 x 13 inch pan. Bake at 350 degrees until brown. Beat cream cheese until creamy; gradually add powdered sugar. Fold in 1 cup Cool Whip. Spread cream cheese mixture onto cooled crust. Prepare pudding as directed. Cool, but do not chill. Carefully spread pudding mixture over cheese mixture. Spoon pie filling over pudding layer. Spread remaining Cool Whip over cherry layer and top with toasted coconut.
SAUSAGE STUFFED JALAPENOS
1 pound bulk pork sausage
1 (8 oz. ) pkg. cream cheese, softened
1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
22 large jalapeno peppers, halved lengthwise and seeded
Ranch salad dressing, optional for dipping
In a large skillet, cook the sausage over medium heat until no longer pink; drain. In a small mixing bowl, combine the cream cheese and Parmesan cheese; fold in sausage. Spoon about 1 tablespoon into each jalapeno half. Place in 2 ungreased baking dishes. Bake, uncovered, at 425 degrees for 20 minutes or until filling is slightly browned and bubbly. Serve with ranch dressing.
