Philly Jail is Allowing Self Guided Tours this Halloween

With the coronavirus and quarantine happening for six months, many places of entertainment are still closed to viewers. As Halloween approaches, many are left wondering whether they will be able to experience the spooky corn mazes, haunted houses and pumpkin patches.

Fortunately, the Eastern State Penitentiary has found a substitute to bring fans back the 200-year-old prison/tourist attraction after cancelling their popular walk-through “Terror Behind the Walls” for the 2020 Halloween season. The Penitentiary has allowed guests to do a self-guided “Night Tour” that brings people through the haunting building, guided by a modified version of “The Voices of Eastern State,” according to Philly Voice.

Special spots along the tour route will include Al Capone’s cell, Death Row, and “Prisons Today: Questions in the Age of Mass Incarceration.” Along with those, there will also be two large projection screens airing videos. At Cellblock 3, a silent film shot at the Penitentiary in 1929 will be shown, and at Cellblock 7 viewers will get to watch short animated films created by incarcerated artists for the prison’s 2019 project, “Hidden Lives Illuminated.”

Senior Vice President of the Penitentiary, Sean Kelley, confirms that although they are not doing their normal attractions this year, the “Night Tours” will be just as frightening. "Listening to the real voices of men and women who lived and worked here, watching silent movies from the prison projected onto the massive walls of the prison yard, is an eerie and evocative experience. We have never offered anything like this."

You better act now though if you want to experience the thrilling and chilling tours. Tickets are on sale on the State Penitentiary’s website starting at $19. The “Night Tours” are available from Sept. 18 through Nov. 15.