During the winter of 1940, when its jail was a single building with fewer than 2,000 inmates, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department pulled out all the stops.
The Salvation Army led hymns under the supervision of the jail chaplain. Not content with one musical option, sheriff’s officials also let in choral groups and a five-piece band.
For dinner, the jail served a holiday feast complete with candy, salad, fruit, mashed potatoes and gravy, gelatin — or “gelatine,” as it was spelled in The Times — and even roast veal with sage dressing.
Though the jail population is now far bigger, with more than 12,000 people in custody, this year’s festivities were not quite as elaborate: baked chicken instead of roast veal, with a guitar player and vocalist providing the music.
But the roughly 200 men crowded into the wooden pews of the spartan third-floor chapel of Men’s Central Jail in downtown Los Angeles were still full of smiles — and some tears — on Wednesday as Archbishop José Gomez of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles celebrated the jail’s annual Christmas Mass.