In 1816, assemblyman John H. Beach lobbied New York State to make the town of Auburn the site for a new prison.

[3] Beach and his colleagues secured the contract for the town of Auburn, and sold a plot of land to the state of New York on the north bank of the Owasco Outlet for the prison to be built.

In the 1840s, adult tourists paid twenty-five cents, whereas the children's admittance fee was half the price.

[8] The Auburn Prison attracted enormous amounts of tourists in the middle of the nineteenth century, which added to the town's local economy and service industries.

The contract labor system of Auburn Prison was very financially useful to the state, producing large amounts of money, especially from the manufacturing of shoes and textiles in the 19th century.

There was a communal dining room so that the prisoners could gather together for meals, but a code of silence was enforced harshly at all times by the guards.

As of 2010, Auburn Correctional Facility is responsible for the manufacturing of New York State's license plates.

Later that year, on December 11, Warden Edgar Jennings and six guards were taken hostage by a group of inmates, some of whom had obtained guns in the July riot and concealed them in the interim.

[16][17] On November 4, 1970, inmates succeeded in seizing control of the facility and held 50 people, including guards and outside construction workers, hostage for more than eight hours.

[18] Copper John is a statue of an American Revolutionary War soldier that stands atop the Auburn Correctional Facility.

"John" was originally a wooden statue that was erected atop the administration office of the prison in 1821.