The first weekend of March, 22 men and women walked through buildings filled with nearly two centuries of history. These individuals took part in this year's first public tour of the Missouri State Penitentiary. Since then, over 3,650 visitors have toured the Missouri State Penitentiary in Jefferson City; just over 3,000 toured the prison in 2009.
Interested individuals have traveled from all over the country to tour this historic prison. The tour has attracted visitors from at least 22 different states including South Carolina, Florida, California and Texas.
Besides these individuals who have come to Jefferson City to take the tour, over 100 bus tour groups from throughout the Midwest have booked tours through the Jefferson City Convention and Visitors Bureau.
The Bureau has received countless positive comments via e-mail, phone, mail and face-to-face interaction.
Brenda Jones said, "Prison Tours - WOW. My husband and I treated ourselves and another couple from Illinois to the MSP Tour last Saturday. We were all truly impressed and awed by this rare opportunity to see up close inside this historical treasure. Mark Schreiber is almost as much a treasure as the buildings are. His knowledge and ability to fit together the historical stories and his personal experience makes the tour so much more interesting. This is truly our town's most unique feature and deserves more attention than what it gets (especially financial attention)."
Additional comments from those who have toured the MSP can be found on YouTube (www.YouTube.com/MissouriPenTours).
The Missouri State Penitentiary is now on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Links to each of these social media sites can be found at www.MissouriPenTours.com.
Make sure you scroll to the bottom of the newsletter to get this month's Jefferson City restaurant coupon!
Daniel Helton, sports sales manager, celebrated his 2 year anniversary in June. Congratulations to Daniel and thank you for all that you have contributed to the Convention and Visitors Bureau. 
