The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe - 25: The Prisoner

Episode Date: July 12, 2016

The craziest prison break story you've never heard of.

This is the way I heard it. Hollywood loves a good prison break. From the Count of Monte Cristo to Cool Hand Luke, America will always root for a man unjustly imprisoned who tries to break free, which is why it's so odd that Hollywood has yet to tell us the true story of wit and his remarkable escape from the worst prison in the world. Witt was a model citizen, an army veteran and 40-year-old father who had never broken the law, much less been to jail. Now, he was serving a life sentence for a crime he didn't commit

and living a daily nightmare that made Attica and Alcatraz sound like a trip to Disneyland. Now, after three years of hell, Witt was determined to break free and blow the whistle. First of all, there was the warden. If you thought the villain in Shalshank was rotten, this creep was in a league of his own. Warden Haas was brutal, sadistic, and profoundly corrupt. guards were no better. They beat the inmates often, and for no apparent reason. The work details were cruel and unusual, worse than any Angola chain gang, and the overcrowding was nightmarish. Also, the food was deplorable and in short supply. Like any penitentiary, though, Witt's jail contained a network of inmates who knew how to work the system, and Witt soon joined their ranks.

In time, he was able to smuggle in some radio transmitters and set up a communication system within the prison itself. He then tried to broadcast to the outside world, but to no avail. If Witt wanted to reveal what was really going on behind those ominous gray walls, he would need to tell the world all he had seen, and to do that, he would need to escape. First, he got himself assigned to a work detail in the prison bakery. Then he enlisted the help of two other inmates. Using the dough for bread, he and his co-conspirate, he and his co-conspirate, made a mold of hinges and nuts on the bolted door. The molds allowed Witt to fashion a wrench that would fit over the bolts.

When the time was right, they removed the door and made a break for it. Witt took a bullet in the arm, but somehow they made it to the river where a stolen boat awaited. The dogs were in hot pursuit, but lost the scent, thanks to the cigarette tobacco, Witt used to cover his tracks. Eventually, Witt made it back to safety and told the authorities all he had witnessed. At first, nobody believed him. But Witt was a convincing witness, and thanks to his first-hand accounts and his persistence, the authorities slowly accepted the fact that something terribly wrong was unfolding out there in the countryside.

Warden Haas, for instance, was not really a warden at all. he was a commandant, and the commandant was not merely a sadist. He was a sadist, hired by a lunatic, and put in charge of the worst prison ever built, a prison called Auschwitz. In the early days of the war, the allies were oblivious to the horror of Auschwitz, but Wittold-Piliki was not. He knew what was going on behind those gray walls in the Polish countryside. He'd seen thousands of prisoners enter and none come out. He knew the smokestacks burned round the clock and he'd seen firsthand the terrible ash fall from the sky. But to prove the horror of Auschwitz to the allies, he had to do more than just escape. He had to first get captured on purpose. That is the most

incredible part of an incredible story before escaping from hell. Wittold Policki volunteered to go there. Honestly, I don't know what Hollywood's waiting for. There's even an ironic twist at the end. Two years after his escape, Wittold was spying again, this time on the Soviets who now controlled his beloved country. He was captured, tried, and tortured. The communists were no friends of the Nazis, but they didn't care about Witt's courage or his role in defeating the Germans. And so the Auschwitz volunteer was executed for spying in 1948. Then his name was erased from history until the Berlin Wall finally fell. His last words were long-live-free Poland.

Now please, somebody called Stephen Spielberg and Daniel Day Lewis, so the rest of the world can say. That's the way I heard it. When you manage procurement for multiple facilities, every order matters. But when it's for a hospital system, they matter even more. Granger gets it and knows there's no time for managing multiple suppliers and no room for shipping delays. That's why Granger offers millions of products in fast, dependable delivery.

So you can keep your facility stocked, safe, and running smoothly. Call 1-800-Grangeer, click granger.com, or just stop by. Granger, for the ones who get it done. The ocean delights us as playful otters restore coastal kelp forests. The ocean teaches us how our choices impact even the deepest places. The ocean connects us. Visit Monterey Bay Aquarium.org slash connects.