Old Joliet Prison

The Joliet Correctional Center was authorized by the Illinois state legislature in the 1850s as a replacement for the original state penitentiary at Alton, which had become overcrowded and structurally inadequate by the mid-19th century. Construction began in 1857 and the prison opened for occupancy in 1858, designed in a Gothic-revival style typical of mid-19th-century American institutional architecture. The administration building at the main Collins Street entrance is the most architecturally significant single structure on the site — a substantial limestone Gothic-revival composition with arched windows, turrets, and the kind of intentionally fortress-like presence that 19th-century prison architects believed would deter criminal behavior.

The prison was built almost entirely with locally-quarried Joliet limestone — the same buff-colored dolomitic limestone that gave Joliet its 19th-century industrial identity and is still visible in many of the older buildings downtown. Construction labor came partly from prisoners themselves at the original Alton penitentiary, transferred to Joliet during the build, in an arrangement common to 19th-century American prison construction. The original 1858 building footprint was substantially smaller than the current site; expansions through the 1860s, 1880s, 1920s, and mid-20th century progressively added cell blocks, support buildings, industrial facilities, and the substantial perimeter wall.

Over its 144-year operating history, the Joliet Correctional Center housed many of Illinois's most notorious inmates and operated through some of the most significant chapters in American prison history. Leopold and Loeb (the 1924 Chicago thrill-killers whose case became the basis for multiple films and the play Rope) served portions of their sentences at Joliet. The prison's population peaked around 1,300 inmates in the mid-20th century in cell-block conditions that were severely overcrowded by modern standards. The facility was closed in 2002 as part of a broader Illinois corrections-system modernization that retired several aging 19th-century facilities, and the site sat largely abandoned for the next 16 years.

The Old Joliet Prison's status as one of the most cinematic locations in Illinois rests on a long string of film and television productions across more than four decades. The 1980 John Landis film The Blues Brothers is the most-cited reference and the cultural anchor that brings most contemporary visitors to the site; the film's opening sequence shows Jake (John Belushi) being released from the prison's main gate after a three-year sentence, and the entire 'Joliet Jake' nickname that runs through the film derives from this opening. The release scene was filmed at the actual Collins Street administration building gate, and the same architectural composition that visitors photograph today is the one Belushi walks out of in the film.

The 2005-2009 Fox television series Prison Break used the Joliet exterior and various interior locations as the fictional Fox River State Penitentiary across multiple seasons. The series' production team used Joliet extensively during the prison's post-2002 abandoned period — the empty facility provided a working-prison aesthetic without the complications of filming at an actively-operating institution, and the Gothic-revival architectural detail produced television visuals that contributed substantially to the series' on-screen identity.

Beyond Blues Brothers and Prison Break, the site has appeared in a range of other films and television productions including various crime dramas, music videos, and documentary projects. The current guided-tour script covers the major film associations and points out specific filming locations as visitors move through the site, though the tour's primary focus remains the prison's actual operational history rather than its film resume.

Between the 2002 closure and the 2018 tour reopening, the Old Joliet Prison sat largely abandoned and progressively deteriorated. Roofs failed in several buildings; vandals broke in repeatedly; vegetation grew through cracked masonry; and the site's future was uncertain for over a decade. National preservation organizations including the National Trust for Historic Preservation flagged Joliet as one of the most endangered historic American prison sites, and local preservation advocates worked through the 2010s to assemble the funding and the partnership structure needed to stabilize the site.

The 2018 reopening was led by the Joliet Area Historical Museum in partnership with the City of Joliet, which had acquired the site from the State of Illinois. The initial tour operation focused on the administration building, the perimeter wall, and selected exterior areas; subsequent expansions through 2019, 2020 (interrupted by COVID), and into the 2020s have progressively added interior access to cell blocks, the chapel, the warden's office area, and other previously off-limits spaces. The tour operation generates the revenue that funds ongoing stabilization work; the site remains officially classified as a partial ruin and substantial preservation work is still underway.

Visitors should expect the site to present as an active preservation project rather than a fully-restored heritage attraction. Many interior spaces show genuine deterioration — peeling paint, broken windows, missing flooring, partial roof failures — and the tour script openly addresses the site's complicated history including the prison-conditions failures of the late 20th century. The combination of the deteriorated authentic interiors and the genuinely complicated historical narrative is part of what makes the Joliet tour experience different from more polished American historic-site presentations.

The standard guided tour runs approximately 90 minutes, costs $30 per adult, and covers the administration building exterior, the main yard, the perimeter wall walk, and selected interior spaces depending on current preservation status. Tours are led by trained docents who cover the prison's 144-year operational history, the major film associations, notable inmates, and the architecture in approximately equal measure. Group sizes are typically limited to 20-30 people per tour and reservations through jolietprison.org are strongly recommended for weekend and peak-season tours.

Beyond the standard tour, the site operates several specialty tour formats including extended history tours (3 hours, deeper coverage of the operational history, $45+), film-focused tours (specifically covers Blues Brothers, Prison Break, and other film locations on the site, typically $50), evening lantern-lit tours (limited dates, atmospheric tour after dark, $45+), and occasional after-hours paranormal-investigation events targeted at the specific subset of visitors interested in the prison's reputation as a haunted location. The specialty tour calendar is published on jolietprison.org and varies substantially by season.

Practical considerations: tours involve substantial walking on uneven historical surfaces and stair-climbing; closed-toe shoes and weather-appropriate clothing are essential. The site is not heated or air-conditioned in most areas and visitors should dress for outdoor and unconditioned-interior conditions. Photography is generally permitted during tours though flash restrictions may apply in some interior spaces. Visitors with mobility limitations should call ahead to confirm tour accessibility for specific routes.

The natural Joliet day plan combines the Old Joliet Prison with the Rialto Square Theatre (about a mile and a half south) and the Joliet Area Historical Museum & Route 66 Welcome Center at the old Union Station. The classic sequence: arrive in Joliet from Chicago (about 40 miles northeast) around 10 AM, start at the Welcome Center for orientation and Blues Brothers context, take a midmorning prison tour, have lunch at Rich & Creamy or a downtown Joliet restaurant, and end with the 1:30 PM Rialto tour on a Tuesday or Saturday. The Welcome Center can also help visitors plan around the prison's variable tour calendar.

For travelers based in Chicago who want to do Joliet as a day trip rather than as part of a Route 66 drive, the prison is reachable via I-55 south from downtown Chicago in roughly an hour (longer during peak Chicago rush hours). Joliet day-trippers can combine the prison with the Rialto and a downtown Joliet lunch and be back in Chicago by early evening — a more substantial historical day trip than the better-known Chicago-area heritage destinations.

For Route 66 road-trippers continuing south, the prison is the natural last Joliet stop before continuing toward Wilmington (15 miles south, home of the Gemini Giant and the Launching Pad restaurant) and the broader Day-1 Illinois Route 66 corridor toward Pontiac and Bloomington. Some travelers prefer to make Joliet their first overnight stop and start a fuller Route 66 drive from there the following morning, particularly if they have a Tuesday or Saturday Rialto tour booked.