LOCAL LEADERS The Prison farm
Concord residents driving around the rotary on the Route 2 by-pass in West Concord may have noticed cows grazing or corn growing on the state prison lands on both sides of the highway. On the north side is the Northeastern Correctional Center (NECC), a minimum-security state prison, and on the south side—bordered by the Assabet River to the east and Warner’s Pond to the west—is the Massachusetts Correctional Institute-Concord, or MCI-Concord, which is a medium-security state prison. This state prison opened in 1878 and became the Massachusetts Reformatory for Men in 1884 (DOC). (There are town residents who still refer to the prison as the “Reformatory.”) This Reformatory trained men under the age of thirty to learn a trade that could be used to gain employment upon release. The prison operated numerous industries, including furniture, hat, clothing, and harness making, and inmates were often contracted to work outside the prison. The community took interest in and felt a lot of pride about the work that the men did there (Garrelick 36-38). In 1955 the Reformatory programs were largely eliminated, and the institution was renamed the Massachusetts Correctional Institute at Concord (DOC).
The barn and silos at the Northeastern Correctional Center’s Prison Farm. Much of the newer infrastructure was built by Dave and inmates in the 1980s. 72
Concord, Massachusetts
Historically, most state institutions had farms, and Concord’s state prison was no exception. In the early years the farm was designed to be self-sufficient, generating almost all of its own food. The prison first operated on the land on the original Reformatory grounds, but in 1935, the Farm Dormitory was established across Route 2 (DOC). In the early years, the farm had workhorses to plough the fields, and raised pigs, cows, chickens, turkeys, hay, and a variety of vegetables (Garrelick 36). This food supply fed inmates throughout the year (Grinkis). Concord’s last dairy farmer Dave Grinkis has been working at the Northeastern Correctional Center’s Prison Farm for forty years. He has been the farm manager since 1978, and is respected by the inmates who get to work alongside him as part of the Farm Services Program. The program used to operate independently from the main prison operation. It was financially viable, and had sister farms in Shirley, Gardener, and Bridgewater. These other programs had their own operations, including beef cattle, vegetables, pheasants, pigs, and fish. Shirley was home to a meat processing plant that butchered the meat raised at the local farms (Grinkis). MCI-Concord had a processing center where fruits and vegetables grown during the season were either canned or frozen for use throughout the winter. However, this facility was dismantled and repurposed as a