Clothing / Laundry

[This was written while in prison.]

When you are admitted to FPC Pensacola, you are assigned the following clothing:

5 green shirts (long-sleeve if you want)
5 green pants
1 green jacket
4 white t-shirts
4 white boxers/briefs
4 pair of white socks

You also get 2 twin sheets, 2 blankets, a pillow and pillow case, 2 laundry mesh bags, and one pair of black Rhino steel-top work boots.

Additionally, you can buy sweats (shirt, shorts, pants) and additional boxers, t-shirts, and socks at the commissary on monday nights.

Only prison camps have green uniforms All other federal prisoners where khaki uniforms. Or so I am told... I have nothing to document that.

The green shirts and pants have your name tag ironed on. The name tag includes your name, id number, and laundry bin number. You laundry bin number is also attached to your laundry mesh bags.

(click to enlarge)


There are two ways to clean your clothes -- use the prison laundry or use the dormitory laundry.

Each dormitory floor has a laundry room for use by inmates. My room is next to the laundry room, which has 3 commercial washers and 3 commercial dryers. Oftentimes, I get up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom (which requires me to walk past the laundry room) and I will see someone doing their laundry (or someone else's -- it is common to pay poor inmates to do your laundry). You can buy laundry soap in the commissary.

This will come as no surprise... I do not do my own laundry. I use the prison laundry.

The prison laundry is located on the backside of the old airplane hangar behind the dorm. I can see it out my window across the staff parking lot. [See second picture at the bottom of the page.]

This is how the procedure works.

Put all your whites and sweats in your mesh laundry bag and use the pull string to tighten the opening (you should also tie a knot to prevent the pullstring from loosening otherwise the contents will empty into the wash).

Walk to the laundry and drop your bag through the chute in the door along with your separate greens. This should be done before 7a. Since your greens have an id number on them, as does your mesh bag, the laundry staff can keep your stuff together.

The mesh bags are loaded into 160lb commercial washers. Of coarse, the greens are washed in separate loads. After washing, they are dried in big tumble dryers. After drying, the green shirts and pants are folded by the inmates who have laundry duty that day. I did this 2 or 3 times during my stay.

The mesh bads and folded greens are then stacked in cubbyhole bins according to each inmate's laundry number (I'm 702 as you can see on my id tag above).

Laundry can be picked up after 2p. In other words, you drop your laundry up before work in the morning and you pick it up when you return in the afternoon. Pretty simple. I usually do it on Monday.

As for linens, you take your 2 sheets, 2 blankets, and pillowcase and exchange them for clean ones; you don't keep washing the same ones over and over.

Inmates run the laundry although they are supervised by a staff person.

I am going to try to keep one set of greens and my work boots when I leave as "souvenirs" but I don't know yet if it is allowed. I thought it would make an original (and authentic!) Halloween costume.

In the meantime, I will get a picture taken of me in greens so you can see that the uniforms are not bad. Except for the name tag, no one would know that you are an inmate. It's not like walking around in an orange jumpsuit.

[UPDATE: I was not allowed to take any clothing with me :( I did get a picture taken which is displayed above. ]