Show convicts learn to jue Make living without pistols in I 1 n prison binm inmates ates study I 1 trades rades learn skills in I 1 in occupations occupation ill JOLIET ILL this Is the firel ars prison I 1 liall h ave ever seen where any body showed me how to mak money without a gun it was a 37 year old penitentiary inmate talking he t spent 18 16 years behind bellind prison wall in half a dozen states I 1 he ae came cam here three and a half years ago or a five to 15 year sentence for armed robbery 1 now he Is one of about 2500 con evicts out of a population of ai and the old jollet joliet here who are fitting themselves I 1 fol foi better lives hes learning to be v printer he plans to use his nev nem skill when he be gets out A guy can make more money it three months operating one of thes machines than I 1 got in all my robberies he says and he have to spend 10 16 years behind walla wall tor for it afterward printing Is one of 37 trades whick convicts can learn at the prison vocational cat ional school they are learnan lear to repair radios watches type writers shoes auto bodies and fen ders the system says warden joseph ragen Is based chiefly on the idea that many men reach the pr prison isoni because they lack sufficient academic or vocational training gives prisoners somers A chanco chance for one reason or another they thel have not had a chance to develop develer their ability to make an honest living he says we try to fit men amen to compete on an honest basis when they are outside again A man can study everything div given en in the average high school course except physics and chemasi chem try the warden says we dont donl want a student tto to com up with a homemade I 1 bomb convicts who co complete milete work get eighth grade and high school diplomas recognized by the stats state de 1 apartment part ment of public instruction warden ragen is optimistic about the ch chances arices for his graduates to find jobs when they leave he has a list of I 1 35 large jarge indus industrial trial plants lr in the chicago area which are willing to hire all trained ten men the parole board hansend can send them I 1 do they make good topnotch master mechanic we had one fellow who came in here with a airth fifth grade education themi the warden aden ie recalls caUs he completed 1 elementary school and then learned the machinists trade when helas be was paroled he went to work in chicago today he la Is a master mechanic for one odthe of the lai largest gest industrial plants in the united states prison farm training has even turned some city men into farmers awe we got one fellow in ln here who know one end of a cow from the ahe other ragen says he spent three years in fai the prison dairy the owner of a string of dairy farms called me up to ask if we had anybody capable of operating a farm I 1 recommended this fellow and when he was paroled he went to work for this owner today he be Is tn in charge ofa of a large dairy farm he gets a month his house and other incidentals free land 6 5 per cent of the farms I 1 profits some time later I 1 saw the farm owner and asked how this parolee was iwas getting along he told me the fellow was the best farm manager he had |