Creepy unmarked cage for people in Superior, Colorado
(Click for big)
Here's a human cage built next to a park in Superior, Colorado. It is designed to contain two people, separated by a metal wall. There's no sign or indication of its intended purpose (beyond the obvious of caging people).
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Art? Judicial humiliation cage for misdemeanor crimes? Both?
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I've seen this before in Ohio. It looks to be an outdoor jail. I was at at an old fashioned hardware store that turned one into booths you could eat at in their cafe. Although this one could be a reproduction, they sure look similar. See for yourself.... http://www.lehmans.com/store/article/1273?Args=
I saw a similar cage in Cedar City, Utah at the Iron Mission State Park. It was reportedly used as a jail cell back in the day.
Hilarious side-note: Superior is literally across the highway from Louisville, CO, ranked #1 in most livable places in America today by Money Magazine.
Tonight!
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Free Speech Cages
There's some kind of hinky looking contraption in the background of the photo on the left.
Nineteenth century holding pen for prisoners in transit. I saw one somewhere in New Mexico many years ago. Or maybe ... Colorado. I've been in all the western states.
http://www.townofsuperior.com/Portals/7/Documents/PDFs/Misc/News%20Letters/Vol.%202,%20No%20Grasso%20Aug04.pdf
It used to be the cell in the town jail in a back room of the Town Hall,
... they all look the same to me.
The most obvious answer: it's more than likely a fundraiser jail for charity festivals held at the park. An "officer" arrests someone, and the "prisoner" has to raise money from passers-by to bail him out and the money goes to the charity.
There's a cage like that inset to the alcove in a building on my campus... of course it's used for storage of groundskeeping equipment, but most of the time it's empty, and therefore quite creepy looking.
It's an old holding cell. Towns without proper jails once used them to contain prisoners until they could be transferred.
I bet these are nice in a lighting storm.
To be perfectly honest, I know a few people with these in their houses.
Here's a similar cage near a park and a mental hospital in Dover, NJ.
http://www.weirdnj.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=27&Itemid=28
Apparently the story is that it's not actually connected with the mental hospital (contrary to local rumor) and in fact was the secure area of a normal indoor jail that was removed during remodeling and stored in a building that later burned down.
Superior's cage may well also have been removed from its or some other town's jail and intended as an exhibit, with an identifying plaque lost or never installed.
No 10# Anon has it perfect with a great article link, the photo is even pretty much identical.
And the "hinky looking contraption" in the background:
If you enlarge the picture, that cage looks brand new. Must be made of adamantium.
I don't know what this is, but I'm pretty sure Damien Hirst is involved somehow.
I've seen that cage, and actually, it is marked. Engraved near the lock is "FRAUENFELDER".
It's a subtle attempt to indoctrinate the mind into accepting the fate of imprisonment. This is a tool of the New World Order.
@Anonymous
Even more hilarious side note: Superior, Colorado is a pristine, new, boring bedroom community that looks like it was literally ripped right out of southern California.
Weird! I grew up-ish in Louisville, and never saw this.
I used to work with the Town of Superior and I believe this is part of a park that they have been planing for quite awhile. It highlights the town's history as an old coal mining camp.
I work about 2 minutes from this cage, it's part of the historic museum of Superior; an old holding cell I believe.
Reminds me of "the couple in the cage" by guillermo gomez-pena and coco fusco.
We have one of those in Parkville, MO near our Nature Sanctuary. It says "Parkville Jail" but the date with it escapes me. I'm trying to find a pic.
they have a single accomodation one in historic San Juan Capistrano, California...where the swallows USED to come back. They say it was an old jail cell.
Superior is also right next-door to Broomfield, CO, which used to be a Klan stronghold back in the '50s.
There's a reason they call it Superior - here are additional photos of my short visit to this town.
There's a very similar cage on Los Rios St. near the train depot in San Juan Capistrano, California. (http://www.daytrippen.com/capo9.html)
It's a circa 1890s holding cell for prisoners. (Probably prisoners awaiting transport to the County Courthouse and/or jail in Santa Ana.)
Easy, a faraday cage to use in case of lightning strikes nearby... :)
a steampunk anti-RFID skimmer wallet?
ZOMG! This cage is for people who fill out their censuses. Michele Bachmann was right!
Wow! And I thought my local park was accommodating for discreet late-night cruising! You Coloradans are way more forward thinking than I'd've thought!
December 23, 1969: I spent the night in one of these, inside a very large upstairs cell in Raton, New Mexico.
The guy who'd picked us up was AWOL. Cops thought we were too. I had a draft card, but Barry didn't. Mine is still in my wallet.
There is a plaque visible on the ground right in front of it in the top picture. If you zoom in it says: "Faraday was here".
Mmm, fish biscuits
Someone obviously wants to reconstruct the creation of *The Pisan Cantos*...
19 / Antinous: Iron, been inside for decades, fresh coat of paint. It boggled my mind that they were in any way old, and that's the only explanation I could come up with.
Not so unusual - these are called "strap iron jails", and were regularly used in small towns across the country. Examples: http://www.texasescapes.com/Jails/Strap-Iron-Jails-n-Cages-in-Texas.htm
It only took the bear...
There was a similar cage in the park across from where my grandmother used to live in the tiny town of Coggin, IA. I have no idea if it's still there. We used to play in it as kids. I just thought it was part of the playground equipment.
there used to be one of these sitting behind the physical plant buildings at south dakota state university.. the manufacture looks almost exactly the same. i was told it was taken out of a wooden structure that acted as the jail, i wouldnt be surprised if they were fairly common throughout the upper midwest/west, anyplace they built faster then the bricks showed up.
If it wasn't for the fold down seat I would have thought this was a Bear cage, it is a park. Perhaps they like to sit as well?
Like in Lost!
No matter what it's really designed for, I think it's a good piece of public art-- unlike a lot of public art which is easy to ignore, this thing does seem to pique people's interest. Plus you can "upgrade" it by actually putting some people on display inside it.
There's a town nearby where they have an annual summer event wherein the mayor is "jailed", and it's used to raise money for charity somehow. I wonder if these are used for something like that. Not very attractive... I hope they're locked closed, so bullies can't lock their prey in them overnight.
It's a faraday cage. It keeps the government from controlling you with their mind control machines from their spy satellites. This gives brief respite to the paranoid.
I blame Boulder.
#7 Chris wins for "Free Speech Cages."
Antinous: Can you be more imperfectly honest in the future please? ;P
You don't think it's for half man half monkey hybrids cellularly modified by some crazy mad scientists in the Caribbean? Uht-oh the crazed beasts are on the loose!? If someone doesn't call the proper authorities 100's of innocents could be eaten alive by these uncontained "werewolves". At the least, it is a strange discovery.
see what is available since they closed guantanamo
i can see myself curling up in there
after all it is my fault
cue
Gil Scott Heron - `B' Movie
i believe in ultimate solutions
Can you be more imperfectly honest in the future please?
You probably don't want to hear the lucite floor story then.
You wouldn't find it creepy when it's defending you and yours from zombies. There's a trap door inside that stores the shotguns and emergency axes. Part of the money for the rural electrification project went for these babies. Good works of the federal government going woefully unappreciated.
Antinous: Ok, I'll bite. What happened on the lucite floor? (*prepares to wince*) You don't have to be perfectly honest. We will allow for mistakes.
Snig@~56: FTW!
My home town in Nebraska has a cage like that. It is left over from the sheriff's building.
the splits?
What happened on the lucite floor?
My contractor friend has built many 'special' rooms. The lucite floor was in a second story cage used for coprophilia scenes. He also did an entire room addition consisting of a twelve-person shower with an inexplicably enormous drain in the floor.
Sorry I asked, once I looked that word up. X0
There is one of these in a restaurant in the middle of Iowa, but as decoration. It used to serve as a local jail.