By Trisha Thadani
San Francisco Chronicle
SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — Florence Stewart remembers Alcatraz for more than its convicts, choppy shark-infested waters and sprawling views of San Francisco. She remembers it as an island with beautiful gardens that she once called home.
As the daughter of a former warden, 87-year-old Stewart is one of the few people who still remember what it was like to live on the island. But Sunday was the last time that she and her fellow Alcatraz alumni — former convicts, guards and their families — will gather on the island for an official reunion, a tradition that lasted 30 years or so.
“It’s sad,” she said. “It’s a wonderful get-together that brings back so many memories.”
The National Park Service, which helped organize the reunion every year, is ending the tradition because it is getting harder and harder to find alumni to come to the island. The prison closed in 1963, and many of the island’s former residents have passed away or moved out of the Bay Area.
“Just like World War II veterans, we’re running out of people to tell the story,” said John Cantwell, an Alcatraz park ranger who has helped organize the alumni event for about 20 years. “It’s getting a little watered down.”
Stewart still vividly remembers bits and pieces of her childhood, most of which she spent on Alcatraz. She moved there when she was 3 and took the ferry back and forth to the mainland until she moved off the island when she was 20.
For her, the yearly alumni events were the equivalent of a high school reunion.
On Sunday morning, which was graced with a rare blue-sky summer day, hundreds of tourists shuttled on and off the island. Inside, they could mingle with the alumni and listen to speeches about their time on the island.
Former convict William Baker, 85, captivated a crowd of about 200 people, who listened to his memories of Alcatraz as well as those of his fellow convicts, who talked not just about their crimes but also about the bridge and ball games on the weekend, and the delicious pork chops they would sometimes get for dinner.
“We came to Alcatraz as prisoners for breaking the rules somewhere else,” he said. “We were a bunch of hard-headed convicts. ... We could handle this place.”
Since leaving prison, Baker has been making money — “more money than (Gov.) Jerry Brown,” he jokes — by selling copies of his book about his time in prison, “Alcatraz #1259.” He said he first came back to the island about five years ago, and he said he will keep coming back even without the alumni events.
But former prison guard Jim Albright and his wife, Cathy, don’t know how much they will come back anymore. Since leaving the island, they moved to Indiana — and the trip out here is just too expensive.
They lived on Alcatraz for about four years before it closed and built a deep connection to it. Both of their daughters have “Alcatraz” written on their birth certificates.
Jim Albright couldn’t tell you exactly how long he and his wife have been coming back to the island for the alumni events, but he said that if he had to guess he’d say it has been about 10 years — every year just as special as the last, he said.
But he could tell you about a moment a few years ago when he stepped off the boat during his first visit to Alcatraz in 35 years: He was so happy to be back that he was almost moved to tears. During a 6½-hour walk on Alcatraz that day, he said every crevice of the island reminded him of something — from the old cells to the old clothing room he used to work in, where he could still tell you the names and sizes of everyone who would come by twice a week.
“I was like a sponge soaking everything up,” he said. “And then from then on, we would come back every year.”
He said it was nice to come back every year and keep the old memories alive with other people who lived on the island. He will miss the tradition.
“This is so sad,” he said. “This is part of our enjoyment for the year.”
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