Eastham Prison Farm
Lovelady, Houston County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The Eastham family purchased a 12, 790 acre plantation in 1891. Property was leased soon afterward to the Texas State Prison System for farming on a shared basis. The landowner supplied seed, machinery, tools and mules, while the state provided labor to plant, tend and harvest the crops. The state received 60 percent of the cotton and 50 percent of the sugar cane. The state bought the land in 1915 after the death of Mrs. Delha Eastham. Eastham Prison Farm was among the first to construct a maximum security building in 1919. The state ferry, erected in 1920 by convict labor, crossed the Trinity River into Madison County. Prisoners used picks and shovels to cut into the steep river banks to build a road wide enough for wagon travel. Unrest among the prisoners was curtailed when noted penologist O.B. Ellis, General Manager of the prison system including Eastham, ushered in more progressive treatment of the inmates. Advancements included improved living and working conditions, introduction of a library, gymnasium, craft shop and chapel, and an education program. Eastham continues to be a major part of the state's prison system. Community benefits include improved roads and a source of employment.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
The Eastham family bought a nearly 13,000-acre plantation in Houston County in 1891 and soon leased it to the Texas prison system for share-farming, the landowner supplying tools and mules while convict labor worked the fields. The state bought the land outright in 1915 and made Eastham a hard-labor institution, building an early maximum-security unit in 1919 and using inmate labor to carve roads and a Trinity River ferry crossing. Decades later, penologist O. B. Ellis brought reforms — a library, chapel, and education program — that eased the farm's grim reputation.
Why it matters
Eastham embodies the troubled history of convict labor and prison farming in the American South, and its later reforms mark the slow, contested emergence of a more humane approach to incarceration.
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Related people
- · O. B. Ellis
- · Delha Eastham
Themes & tags
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