“Defiant Convict Perches Atop 100-Foot Tower,” Atlanta Constitution. July 24, 1940. Page 01.
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Federal Pen Preferred to Prison Camp
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Was To Have Left U.S. Cell Today, Armed With Hammer
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Armed with a machinist’s hammer, a 20-year-old convict yesterday afternoon took refuge on a precarious perch atop the Atlanta federal penitentiary’s 100-foot-high water tower, and continued to defy all efforts to dislodge him early this morning.
While prison floodlights brilliantly illuminated the strange drama, the youthful prisoner banged on the tank with the heavy hammer, and waved to hundreds of persons gathered in the streets below. During the day and night, thousands of persons saw the man on the tower.
Identified by Warden J. W. Sanford as Andrew Jackson Wynne, of Savannah, the prisoner showed little effects of his long vigil early this morning and continued performing for the spectators.
Defies Guards
Clad in the gray denim trousers of the ‘Big House,’ he defied all pleas of guards that he come down, remaining high on his perch through the night and into today, when he was to have been a free man again.
His reluctance to accept freedom, however, was explained by prison officials, who said that there is a detainer against him from the Chatham county prison camp, from which he escaped September 25, 1937.
Red-Hot Poker.
His Chatham sentence - four to five years - followed the burglary of an Episcopal minister’s apartment, when he threatened to burn the minister’s feet with a red-hot poker after the clergyman refused to give him money.
He was arrested by federal authorities in Virginia for violation of the motor vehicle theft law in 1938 and sentenced to two years in the penitentiary here. He began serving his sentence November 2, 1938.
Since 1:30 Yesterday
According to the warden, Wynne climbed the ladder to the top of the water tower at about 1:30 o'clock yesterday afternoon. Wynne promptly took off his shirt and made himself at home high in the air, apparently unmindful of the torrid rays of the mid-July sun.
Presence of the prisoner on the unusual lodging place aroused excitement in the neighborhood of the prison. Wynne was plainly visible from McDonnough boulevard. Several persons trained field glasses upon him. Now and then Wynne yelled and waved his shirt at onlookers.
He appeared to be sunburned, but Warden Sanford said he had been on the work shift recently, and that for this reason Wynne was used to the sun and apparently undisturbed by the blistering heat.
Causes Trafic Jam.
As Wynne sat down on the tower, a traffic jam occurred around the prison as cars halted and their drivers and passengers craned necks to look at the convict during the home-going rush hours.
Asked what he intended to do about Wynne, Warden Sanford said:
‘He’s got a heavy hammer and I don’t think it good judgement risking the lives of guards in attempting to dislodge him. Wynne knows he will have to finish his prison camp sentence and took this method of making it known that he’d rather stay in the prison here than leave it.’
Photo Caption:
HEY! LOOK AT ME! - Armed with a hammer, Andrew Jackson Wynne, 20, took a defiant stand yesterday atop the 100-foot-high water tower at the federal penitentiary. Warden J. W. Sanford said Wynne was due to leave the prison today, and that the young convict did not want to leave because there is a detainer against him from the Chatham county prison camp. Wynne’s presence on the tower attracted attention of thousands of spectators. He was still on the tower last night.