Bronx Chronicle Birthday of the Day January 28, 2016

Robert Franklin Stroud, the Birdman of Alcatraz (1890)

Stroud was a convicted murderer serving timein prison when he came across some injuredsparrows in the Leavenworth prison yard. He kept the birds andsoon began raising canaries, which he could sell for supplies andto help support his mother. Using equipment furnished by a newwarden, Stroud created an aviary and became an expert in avianpathology, writing two books on the subject and developing a curefor hemorrhagic septicemia. How much of his sentence wasspent in solitary confinement? More…