Why did prisoners have to wear horizontal stripes on their uniforms? Was it supposed to represent the bars or something?
Question #4989. Asked by AOR.
Last updated Aug 05 2021.
mend21
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mend21
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Currently voted the best answer.
They made the prisoners standout so they could be easily identified from the guards. The ensemble not only made prisoners easier to see, but it was symbolic of their shame.
Response last updated by gtho4 on Oct 14 2016.
Aug 09 2000, 4:19 AM
zbeckabee
Answer has 5 votes
zbeckabee Moderator 19 year member
11752 replies
Answer has 5 votes.
St. Petersburg Times, July 5, 2001 -- Stripes came into vogue in the early 19th century. The black and white bands were supposed to symbolize cell bars -- a scarlet letter for convicts. Just after the Civil War, all the inmates were wearing them.
But by the early 1900s, people were thinking differently about prisons and punishment. In 1904, at the height of the Progressive era, New York's superintendent of prisons stopped making his inmates wear stripes, calling such suits a "badge of disgrace." Federal prisoners didn't wear stripes after 1914. Florida inmates wore striped pants through the mid 1930s.
sptimes.com/News/070501/Floridian/Cellblock_chic.shtml no longer exists
Response last updated by gtho4 on Aug 05 2021.
Apr 06 2008, 10:27 AM