How Alcatraz became America's most notorious prison
US President Donald Trump wants to convert Alcatraz back into a federal prison decades after the California island fortress was converted into a US tourist destination.
The prison off the coast of San Francisco is where the government sent notorious gangsters Al Capone and George "Machine Gun" Kelly as well as lesser-known men who were considered too dangerous to lock up elsewhere.
It is best known for its years as a federal prison, from 1934-63, but its history is much longer.
In 1850 President Millard Fillmore declared the island for public purposes, according to the park service, and it soon became a military site. Confederates were housed there during the Civil War.
By the 1930s, the government decided that it needed a place to hold the worst criminals, and Alcatraz became the choice for a prison.
The remoteness eventually made it impractical.
Everything from food to fuel had to arrive by boat.
The cost to house someone there in 1959 was $10.10 a day compared with $3 at a federal prison in Atlanta, the government said.
It was cheaper to build a new prison from scratch.
Despite the location, many prisoners tried to get out: 36 men attempted 14 separate escapes into the bay, according to the FBI.
Nearly all were caught or didn't survive the cold water and swift current.
Here a rifle grenade fired by a soldier explodes at an already shattered and pock marked window at the Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary where rioting prisoners are cornered after killing two guards and wounding 15, in 1946.
Escape from Alcatraz, a 1979 movie starring Eastwood, told the story of John Anglin, his brother Clarence and Frank Morris, who all escaped in 1962, leaving behind handmade plaster heads with real hair in their beds to fool guards.
Alcatraz became part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and was opened to the public in 1973, a decade after it was closed as a prison.
The park service says the island gets more than 1 million visitors a year who arrive by ferry.
A ticket for an adult costs $47.95, and visitors can see the cells where prisoners were held.
In 1969, a group of Native Americans, mostly college students, claimed to have a historical right to Alcatraz and began an occupation that lasted for 19 months until federal authorities intervened in 1971.
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