Thought provoking Thursdays

Today it is Doris' turn to provide the challenge in the Get it Scrapped blog challenge . Every thursday this month will create a post to get thinking happening on Thursdays. Today's post is about coming up with journaling to go with our photos as there are just so many approaches that can be taken to come up with journaling. Her challenge is to flip through some o recent photos. Find one that speaks to you and try to think of more than one angle you could use with your journaling.
I decided to use Doris' model of trains of thought about this particular photo I took today.
Event focused: Shirley and I had our lunch break from writing and it was well and truly my turn to be the lunch provider and Shirl suggested we go out to Pentridge for lunch. This was fulfilling a couple of needs- one was lunch itself the other was to experience the bizarre absurdity of turning one of the major penitentiaries of Melbourne into a housing estate and restaurant. That's right we went to jail for lunch!

Relationship focused: No I haven't spent time in prison and no I do intend to! Can't now really as it is no longer a prison but then ...... A number of years ago however I was working in a school in Melbourne and a group of students I was working with were exploring government. One aspect to the exploration involved them in giving evidence to the Senate Inquiry on the Status of Teaching. Their work and role was significant in that not many 11 & 12 year olds give evidence to Senate Inquiries. All that is another story the upshot of it was that our photo appeared in the Herald Sun and about two weeks later I received a letter at the school from an old friend. He was studying law at the time I knew him and his life's path had a taken a very poor turn when he made disastrous decisions about investment of funds for a basketball club. His letter was written from the prison farm at which he was still serving time but he had begun his prison term in Pentridge and had described what he could remember of his initial incarceration after sentencing. All this was going through my mind as we walked back to the car in the parking lot/ car park outside the restaurant.

Your own perspective: The rose on the wall- was it planted by the wardens or inmates?
How long has that red rose been there? It looks old and "rose hipped".
The red against the grey/ blue stone is startling and bright.
The idea that someone thought a restaurant with slogans like- "Doing time never tasted so good" was truly a tad bizarre. I thought I've got my material here for surreal Sunday! Fortunately the food was far better than I have been led to believe prison food is like.


Historical perspective: Pentridge Prison has a history!

As a result of a greatly increased crime rate in Victoria due to the gold rush, the government decided to establish a number of penal stockades and also make use of abandoned ships.

Pentridge is built.

One of these stockades was set up at Pentridge (the old name for Coburg) to receive, in December 1850, sixteen prisoners from the overcrowded Melbourne Gaol.

Pentridge was thought to be a good place for a prison, being near Melbourne, yet isolated from it. Moreover the village reserve was the only Crown Land left unsold. The purpose of the stockade was to provide labour for the construction of the newly proclaimed Sydney Road. There was a lot of bluestone in the area so the prisoners could do 'hard labour' breaking up the stone and working on the unmade road.
Residents were frightened and angry because the stockade consisted only of log huts on wheels behind a low 1.2 metre wooden fence with prisoners guarded by an inadequate number of overseers. Because it was so insecure, mounted aboriginal troopers (police) were employed to patrol its perimeter. The first superintendent of the stockade was Mr Samuel Barrow.

Pentridge closed. For a long time, Coburg Council tried to have the prison moved or closed. In 1994, the State Government announced its program to privatise prisons. In May 1997 the northern half of the prison was officially closed and the prisoners sent elsewhere. June 1997 saw the beginning of public tours of the prison. The southern part of the prison closed on 28 November that year and in 1999 the site was sold. It has now been developed as housing estates, parklands and a business precinct.

I could probably go on and on from just this one photo and create a page about Pentridge, thanks Doris.