The penitentiary refined the revolutionary system of separate incarceration, first pioneered at the Walnut Street Jail, which emphasized principles of reform rather than punishment.

[7] Notorious criminals such as Al Capone and bank robber Willie Sutton were held inside its innovative wagon wheel design.

For their role in the Kelayres massacre of 1934, James Bruno (Big Joe) and several male relatives were incarcerated here between 1936 and 1948, before they were paroled.

[8] At its completion, the building was the largest and most expensive public structure ever erected in the United States,[9] and quickly became a model for more than 300 prisons worldwide.

Designed by John Haviland and opened on October 25, 1829, Eastern State is considered to be the world's first true penitentiary, with seven corridors of heated and sky-lighted cells capable of holding 500 convicts in isolation.

[10] Critic and activist John Neal in 1841 expressed revulsion at the international reputation of "a nation that broke away from all its bands and fetters, only fifty or sixty years ago — overthrowing prisons, palaces, and thrones in her march toward universal emancipation, already renowned throughout the whole earth, for her prisons, her manacles, and her badges of servitude.

[12] Cell accommodations were advanced for their time, including a faucet with running water over a flush toilet, as well as curved pipes along part of one wall which served as central heating during the winter months where hot water would be run through the pipes to keep the cells reasonably heated.

A contemporary newspaper article reported that the governor donated his own dog to the prison to increase inmate morale.

[2] On April 3, 1945, a major escape was carried out by twelve inmates (including the infamous Willie Sutton), who over the course of a year managed to dig an undiscovered 97-foot (30 m) tunnel under the prison wall.

In 1988, the Eastern State Penitentiary Task Force successfully petitioned Mayor Wilson Goode to halt redevelopment.

Most of the early prisoners were petty criminals incarcerated for various robbery and theft charges (muggers, pickpockets, purse-snatchers, burglars, etc.)

While some have argued that the Pennsylvania system was Quaker-inspired, there is little evidence to support this; the organization that promoted Eastern State's creation, the Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons (today's Pennsylvania Prison Society) was less than half Quaker, and was led for nearly fifty years by Philadelphia's Anglican bishop, William White.

Proponents of the system believed strongly that the criminals, exposed, in silence, to thoughts of their behavior and the ugliness of their crimes, would become genuinely penitent.

In reality, the guards and councilors of the facility designed a variety of physical and psychological torture regimens for various infractions, including dousing prisoners in freezing water outside during winter months, chaining their tongues to their wrists in a fashion such that struggling against the chains could cause the tongue to tear, strapping prisoners into chairs with tight leather restraints for days on end, and putting the worst behaved prisoners into a pit called "The Hole", an underground cellblock dug under cellblock 14 where they would have no light, no human contact, and little food for as long as two weeks.

[16] When the Eastern State Penitentiary, or Cherry Hill as it was known at the time, was erected in 1829 in Francisville (the idea of this new prison was created in a meeting held at Benjamin Franklin's house in 1787) it was the largest and most expensive public structure in the country.

Haviland found most of his inspiration for his plan for the penitentiary from prisons and asylums built beginning in the 1780s in England and Ireland.

[17] These complexes consist of cell wings radiating in a semi or full circle array from a center tower whence the prison could be kept under constant surveillance.

The design for the penitentiary which Haviland devised became known as the hub-and-spoke plan which consisted of an octagonal center connected by corridors to seven radiating single-story cell blocks, each containing two ranges of large single cells—8 × 12 feet × 10 feet high—with hot water heating, a water tap, toilet, and individual exercise yards the same width as the cell.

Visitors are allowed to walk into several specially marked solitary confinement cells, but most of them remain off limits and filled with original rubble and debris from years of neglect.

[22] Religious murals in the prison chaplain's office, painted in 1955 by inmate Lester Smith, remain visible to guests despite damage from exposure to sunlight.

[38] The early events took various forms, including short theatrical performances and true tales of prison murder and violence.

[38] In 1997, the event was rebranded as "Terror Behind the Walls", becoming a high startle, low gore walkthrough haunted attraction.

[42] Due to its ominous appearance, gloomy atmosphere, and long history, Eastern State has been used as a location for television programs and films about hauntings.

Eastern State was also used in an episode of Cold Case titled "The House" which dealt with a murder after an inmate escape.

In June 2008, Paramount Pictures used parts of Eastern State Penitentiary for the filming of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.