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Famous Philadelphia Prison Escape Spotlighted At Eastern State

By John McDevitt

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - Eastern State Penitentiary in Fairmount is now a tourist designation, but it once housed some of the country's most famous criminals with stories that made headlines.

Friday marks the 70th anniversary of a famous Philadelphia prison escape.

Bank robber Willie Sutton -- also known as "the actor" because he wore costumes to perform bank heists across the country -- was an inmate at Eastern State. He was one of twelve prisoners who on April 3, 1945 broke out of the penitentiary by way of an underground tunnel. Most were captured a short time later.

Eastern State spokeswoman Annie Anderson says even though Sutton took credit for being the mastermind, it was later discovered prison plaster worker Clarence Klinedinst, with the help of his cellmate, created the passageway from their cell over the course of a year:

"So he (Klinedinst) was given some masonry tools. He would work at night and he would put a panel up during the day and kind of camouflage this panel up against the wall."

sutton escape annie anderson
Eastern State spokeswoman Annie Anderson (Credit: John McDevitt)

The tunnel escape story is part of a pop-up museum at the Penitentiary called Escape! which features artifacts not commonly seen by the public.

Escape! opens Thursday and runs through April 12th.

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