A “calaboose” was usually a one-room jail used to house transients and drunks overnight, before sending them on their way. The following un-edited articles were found in a couple of our early newspapers.

According to the Marshall County Independent of November 23, 1894, “Every day a number of tramps drift into Plymouth and enjoy the luxuriant sleeping accommodations of the city calaboose. It is due to the efforts of Marshalls Meyers and Mead that these gentlemen of indolent leisure are induced to continue their weary wanderings after only partaking of Plymouth hospitality for a few hours. Unless this class of citizens is watched closely by the police everywhere, and more especially in the smaller cities, they quickly become a nuisance. The way to treat them is to give them some place to sleep at night and then send them on their way.”

The Independent of December 2, 1898, said “A report made by the committee on police, heartily recommended that a new calaboose be built, and more, that it be built on the city’s property now occupied partially by the waterworks plant. It was deemed advisable to heat the structure with the waste steam from the exhaust pipe of the pumping engine. The facts which seem to argue strongest for erecting the new calaboose are, first, that the old one is uninhabitable and unsafe. Second, $12 a year rent must be paid for the old one, and the fuel costs much more. The matter of locating and constructing the building has been left in the hands of a committee who will report at the next meeting.

Apparently, the new calaboose was built, because the Independent of April 20, 1900, stated” The new calaboose has already been put to a very good use. For several nights it has been filled with those knights of idleness commonly called hobos and others of a more degenerative order.”

Interestingly, Plymouth’s last “calaboose” was located inside the old Fire House. The headline of the Weekly Republican of October 13, 1910, was “Hobos in Fire House.” The article went on to say “The old calaboose in which many a “weary willie” has been sheltered from the icy blasts of a cold night in Plymouth, is soon to be effaced from the landscape of Plymouth. In its place, a cell is to be fitted up in the fire house, which will harbor the unfortunates during the winter months. The abandonment of the calaboose was made necessary because of the impossibility of heating the little house, as before. The council last evening voted to fix up a cell in the fire house.”

The new calaboose was put to good use according to the Weekly Republican of September 21, 1911. “A well-dressed young man who was decidedly under the weather, made his appearance on Michigan St. Saturday at a little past 7:30. Being unable to keep the sidewalk, officer Jacoby was called to his assistance, and placed him in the cage at the fire house.

The man was well dressed and offered practically no resistance to being locked up. Officer Jacoby states he is from Fort Wayne.”

If you love trivia about history, check out the newspaper files in the Historical Society & Museum archives. We are open from 10:00 until 4:00, Tuesday through Saturday.