Paul -- the following letter is pretty free-wheeling and quite subjective -- not to say chaotic.
I wanted to let you know before hand that the same evaluation, observations, and conclusions are arrived at in the Manual (for my old job) and various enclosures and memoranda that are in the MSP librarians' file at MSL, but in a restrained, relatively objective and deliberative manner. Well aware of my own proclivities and emphases, and peculiar insights and sensitivities, I tried to back off and take a look, comprehensive and fair look at the MDL position and work at MSP, but only as presently conducted but with proposals for the future.
If you are unable, in the end, to have access to these materials, I will be delighted to provide you with a copy of my own set. (End of prefatory notes.)
Well I can see you're already going over the contents of Pandora's box, even at this early stage! I assume you have already asked Dick Peel for the long manual and accompanying memoranda on my work and evaluation of the job, all of which he has. If it does not appear you will be given these materials, let me know and I'll send you the whole shitpot full. Also, Alma Jacobs has a complete file of the above, as well. (So did I, heh, heh!) It would be preferable if one of them gave you access to it (thinking in terms of their support, etc.)
In the Manual and the memoranda I spell out all my views and measurements of the job. I have also this fall written a 15-page (double-spaced) account of the job, called "Prison Librarianship -- Some Controversial Aspects", written in an anonymous context, which I am trying to get published. It is loaned out at the moment, but when it returns I will send you a copy, for yourself. It is thoroughly doctored for anonymity.
I have a package of papers, and also a number of posters, both of which I will try to get off this week. It might get a bad reaction if Crist sees my mailing address on the papers, but "I can't help it". Whether you remove it or not is your business. Crist tends to get terribly upset and "emotionally involved in (his) job" (something he accused me of, by the way.) Hoping you can get access to the above sources, I won't run on here about the job, expect to say that the prison pressure is to get you to identify totally "with the inmates". Cultivate an objective, professional stance and approach. So that any decision you make has been well-though-out. That way you can never be caught off guard.
Paul, try your very cool and patient best to stay there as long as possible --
On the administration people you mentioned: Generally speaking, never trust anything they tell you. (Not totally anyway.) Boyette, Jaksha, Blodgett, Weer, and Yankoskie are first of all the warden's toadies and flunkies. They are excellently conditioned bureaucratic subordinates. Like they talk to the prisoners, they will feed you a story, a line or a "cue" to get you to talk loosely. Control of staff, to Crist's ilk, is every bit as important as control of inmates. (Read the Policy and Procedures on staff conduct in my life.) Communicate orally, not in writing, if at all possible.
Hence the supreme importance of maintaining your own professional integrity. I never had problems with the prisoners, or with line staff -- only with Roger, Joe, and Jim. Blodgett is especially treacherous because he comes on so loosely, easy, and "nice". Don't believe your eyes and ears!! His head is aching for a wardenship all his own, once Crist goofs up badly enough.
Jaksha - a toady and a dunce (but who will be silent at times, too)
Yankoskie - a craven, uptight, paper bully of a dunce
Blodgett - viper (nothing he doesn't say will come to pass) and bully.
Weer - an original nice guy undergoing final institutionalization.
Boyette - a redneck, at bottom
Crist - Hitleresque and arch-chauvinist (watch him around women), custody-obsessed, "Christian" (watch out!), militaristic (chain of command).
But despite all this--
I let 15 months go by before letting it go - I also loved it, and as a first library job I learned an immense amount. I went about my job with full self-respect and with a pride in associating with such a victimized and oppressed clientele, (whose spirit also remains high -- right?) I came to like Montana very much -- try to get East any time you can. (At first I was thoroughly uptight, coming from an urban ghetto straight to rural Montana! Bought a .38 special and was armed most of the time off the job. (Fearful of Montanans!!) But I got over that -- it's a fine life environment really, and maybe someday I'll be working again over there (at least for another stint).
My prior association with parolees and prisoners helped. Plus 3 years army experience (in the 1950's, well remembered though). Also several years in militant civil rights and anti-ware activity. (In Seattle the next stage was terrorism, when Johnson relented...) Not to state my politics -- I'll let you draw your own conclusions.
I kept a detailed journal of my experiences there, as well.
I am corresponding now and then with Al Charlo of the Hunter, and it's a wonder Crist's mail room lets it happen. Others have been refused permission to write me. I asked to be able to write: (list of names). I know several of these are gone, but no matter. Bless every one of their devious hearts! Maybe under capitalism, "deviance" is every person's survival option.
Now to the State library -- bless their hardy trooper souls -- I accept and recognize a minimal degree of bureaucratic complicity on their part (the politics of government?), regarding working with the prison and the Dept. of Institutions. I hope Dick Peel can weather the storm and find the recognition he richly deserves. Though we came to disagree somewhat at the end (I am totally against the concept of a "warden", and the absolute thought control he feels necessary to exercise over staff in every area.) I really appreciated working with him that first year or so. When Alma Jacobs came things sort of fell apart, at MSL, structurewise (organizationally).
The "complicity" I refer to above is derived from: 1. The fact that Peel wasn't upset that Crist had a big dossier on me, which included an excessive amount of evaluative materials by a variety of persons. (I wanted to demand access to it.) 2. The fact that perhaps MSL does the same thing (background checks of an excessively prying nature) and that Peel (for one) sends letters of reference or recommendation without ever sending you a copy. This is a kind of oppression that thoroughly erodes the trust and confidence of "subordinates". If we don't work for the people's best interests, whose interests are we serving?
P.S. Keep in mind too that Deer Lodge is a very small, loyalist town....the barroom walls have eyes and ears.
P.S. Regarding meetings or (audiences) with Crist, or any of his lieutenants; often a certain reaction will be feinted (like shock or whatever with the comix), to put you on the the spot as corrupting innocents, etc. Here let it be said that anyone who stays longer in the closed institution than a nominal period (1-2, 3 years?) is becoming corrupted. The essence of traditional, and closed, institutions is abnormality and prostitution and corruption, both in principle and practice. (Anything to stay on the job, maintain or curry the administration's favor, anything to control the prisoners for control's sake.)
There is a monstrous double standard working in prisons that should see a whole lot of collaborators taken to the wall and shot. One thing we con the public into thinking we're doing; one thing we are really doing. And control of staff under these circumstances is critical. Don't educate them too much. One reason "staff training" has come so late into prisons is because no warden wants an "aware" group of officers to deal with. They might get some self-respect and start reflecting on their work, and on the efficacy and purpose behind "corrections". A lot of line staff come from the same socio-economic experience as the prisoner s they tend -- a situation that has not escaped the "aware" con's observation (see Fred Perry, et al.)
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