The Department of Correction annually inspects the county jails
in Maryland and makes recommendations for their improvement
(Code 1951, Art. 27, sec. 789).

Appropriations 1957 1958

General Funds ....................$72,710 $75,576
Staff: 8
3 State Use Industries Funds

MARYLAND PENITENTIARY
Vernon L. Pepersack, Warden
954 Forrest Street, Baltimore 2 Telephone: Vernon 7-2135

The concept of a central penitentiary for an entire state was a
creation of eighteenth-century humanitarianism in America. For the
first time it was proposed that a penal institution should serve more
than a single county, town, or parish and that it should treat its
inmates, not as enemies of society to be punished, but as penitents to
be reformed. The General Assembly of Maryland, in 1804, appointed
a Commission to construct such an institution, but financial diffi-
culties delayed its completion until 1811. The Penitentiary was the
second institution of its type in the United States and has operated
continously since the date of its opening. During its first 100 years,
a Board of Inspectors or a Board of Managers governed the Peni-
tentiary. In 1917, it was placed under the newly established Board
of Prison Control, now the Board of Correction.

The Penitentiary is a maximum security penal institution for
long-term offenders. All sentences of death are executed at the
Penitentiary.

The Penitentiary has an education and training program, both
vocation and industrial. Prisoners work in the State Use Industries
shops, which provide practical vocational training. The following
shops are now operating: printing, auto tag, shoe manufacturing,
woodworking, brush manufacturing, sewing, mattress and upholster-
ing, metal products, and knitting. A road camp operates out of the
Penitentiary.

The average population of the Penitentiary for the fiscal year 1956
was 1,627.

Appropriations 1957 1958

General Funds .................$1,423,447 $1,527,787
Special Funds ...................... 20,000 20,000

Totals .........................$1,443,447 $1,547,787
Staff: 227 (as allowed by 1958 Budget)
14 Public Works Operations Funds
36 State Use Industries Funds

MARYLAND HOUSE OF CORRECTION
William F. Steiner, Warden
Jessups (Anne Arundel County) Telephone: Elkridge 157

The Maryland House of Correction, established in 1878, is a medium
security penal institution for male offenders who are convicted of
crime and sentenced to imprisonment for three months or more. It
operates a farm and maintains a herd of dairy cattle that supplies