detour #001: Squirrel Cage Jail

Location Council Bluffs, IA · map Admission $10 adults, $8 seniors/students, $5 youth (as of 2026-10) Hours Thu–Sat 10am–5pm, Sun 1pm–4pm; check the official site Visited 2026-07 Worth the drive ★★★☆☆ (3/5) Part of detour, a series on places worth leaving the highway for. 1. Overview Just across the Missouri River from Omaha, in downtown Council Bluffs, sits the Pottawattamie County Squirrel Cage Jail. It was built in 1885, held prisoners until 1969, and is the only three-story rotary jail ever made. Only three rotary jails survive today: this one, a one-story jail in Gallatin, Missouri, and a two-story jail in Crawfordsville, Indiana. The Historical Society of Pottawattamie County now runs the Council Bluffs jail as a museum. If you've never heard of a rotary jail, the idea is simple and a little absurd. William H. Brown and Benjamin F. Haugh patented the design in 1881: instead of lining cells up along a corridor, you put the inmates in pie-shaped cells inside a large iron drum and…