Share Your Memories Of McNeil Island

Question: What memories do you have of McNeil Island Corrections Center?

Although the McNeil Island Corrections Center is visible from the shores of Fox Island and Key Peninsula, it often seemed like it was a world away.

For more than 135 years, the federal-turned-state prison that's located on the Puget Sound island operated in silence right in front of us. However, on Friday, April 1, the Washington State Department of Corrections closed the prison in order to save the state $9 million a year in maintenance and ferry fees.

When the South Sound was spending the night out, it was lights out for the inmates of the oldest prison in the Northwest. While people on this side of the Sound saw trees and eagles soaring overhead when looking at McNeil, the inmates most likely saw life on the outside, their freedom on this side.

Only three or four miles away, but yet so far away. Civilization was so close to incarceration.

Growing up, I had heard stories about inmates who had escaped the prison facility only to meet their cold, watery end in Puget Sound. It gave me chills. Still does, actually.

I have a family friend who was a guard at McNeil up until a few months ago, when he was transferred. He didn't want to go.

I'm sure Patch readers, with a lot more experience and memories of McNeil Island than I do, can share story after story about the prison.

So, as McNeil Island,  Gig Harbor Patch wants to hear from you.