The facility was designed by Atlanta architects
Tucker & Howell. The modern classic architecture included a central tower and courtyard, and frieze by
Julian Harris titled
Rehabilitation depicting trades and occupations. It opened in 1937. The building had been extensively renovated and expanded since. On January 1, 1938, Georgia's death row and execution chamber relocated from the old state prison at
Milledgeville, where it had been since the September 13, 1924 execution of 22-year-old Howard Hinton, to GSP. One of the prisoners executed here was
Lena Baker, an
African American maid from
Cuthbert, Georgia, who had been wrongfully convicted of murdering her employer. Killed in March 1945, she remains the only woman electrocuted by the state. From 1964 until 1976 the
U.S. Supreme Court suspended executions. Then in June 1980 Georgia's site of execution was moved to the
Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison (GD&CP) near
Jackson, Georgia in Butts County. A new electric chair was installed in place of the previous one, which was put on display on the upper floors of the main building. Also on display are prison documents containing names, authorizations, and last statements of the prisoners. In the 1940s and 1950s, volunteers were offered $25 to flip the switches which would start the flow of electricity and eventually lead to the death of the prisoner. Inmates would often be doused with saltwater to improve the electrical connection and to hasten death. Georgia State Prison was the first US prison to be accredited by the
American Medical Association and the
American Correctional Association. The facility was the filming location of the film
The Longest Yard that starred
Burt Reynolds,
Eddie Albert, and
James Hampton. The prison was closed by the Georgia Department of Corrections on February 19, 2022, due to aging infrastructure and the need to safely house larger numbers of violent inmates and gang members. Prior to closure, all prisoners had been transferred to other locations. ==Notable prisoners==