A ball flew out of Eastern State carrying a message on this week in Philly history
Jeffrey Curry, serving a burglary sentence, wrote a message to his family — "With all my love and kisses" — and hurled it over the prison walls. An 11-year-old girl found and delivered it.
The genius of the message lies in the simplicity of its delivery.
In the spring of 1957, Jeffrey Curry was serving a two-to-five stretch at Eastern State Penitentiary in Fairmount for burglary. Meanwhile, his young wife was juggling two infants by herself in North Philadelphia.
The 21-year-old prisoner, with time to reflect but without tools to reach his family, decided to bounce his message out.
Curry rustled up a pink rubber ball, and crudely wrote a note around the sphere in ink:
“Please, sir or miss, if this ball gets over the ‘wall,’ will you please give this to my ‘son’ Jeffrey Curry, address 1700 W. Master sts. and ask for Louise? Thank you very much.”
On the other side he added:
“With all my love and kisses.”
And then he pointed north on the cloudy and humid afternoon of May 26, 1957, and hurled a Hail Mary over the prison’s hewn-and-squared granite walls.
Hope and a prayer
Church had just let out.
The Mazur family, who lived a block away from the imposing hub-and-spoke-styled prison, were walking home from 9 a.m. services at the former St. Hedwig’s Church at 24th and Brown.
When they reached 21st Street, a ball sailed over the prison wall, bounced off the streetscape, and rolled near the feet of 11-year-old Marie Ann Mazur.
At first “she gleefully tossed it in the air,” The Inquirer reported.
And then upon closer examination she exclaimed:
“Look, daddy, there’s writing on it.”
The great escape
The plan was for Marie Ann to participate in the church’s May procession later that afternoon, but this was divine intervention.
“Let’s take it to them,” she told her parents.
Her father, Frank Mazur, took his daughter to meet the inmate’s wife and sons.
They walked up to the second-floor apartment, and explained how the message escaped the prison’s walls.
“Oh, isn’t this wonderful?” said a tearful Louise Curry, cradling 4-month-old Anthony in one arm, and reassuring 16-month-old Jeffrey Jr. with the other.
Her husband had started serving his sentence in February, and Anthony was born not long after. Jeffrey Curry met his new son in March during a prison visit.
A few days after the toss, penal authorities increased security at the city’s four major prisons to avoid more throwing of objects outside their walls.
The warden didn’t suspect Curry had ulterior motives, The Inquirer reported, but he did fear it becoming a new way to smuggle out contraband.
