The year before I came to prison, in 2005, California banned all non-prison-issued denim in men’s prisons.
Despite this ban, jeans were still being advertised with pictures in our vendor catalog, from which we were permitted to make purchases. I would look in that catalog and daydream about owning a pair.
The Levi’s looked stylish and normal compared to our prison uniforms. They also held a special place in my heart.
When I was growing up on California’s welfare system in the 1980s and ’90s, we had so little, even a pair of shoes or a pack of underwear meant a lot to me and my sister.
For my mom, her most prized possession was a pair of Levi’s 501s. If only for one night a week, she wanted to go out and look good and feel good about herself. She always did that with jeans that she felt transcended lifestyle and social class.
I don’t know if it was the jeans or the happiness in her eyes, but there was something about seeing my mom in her Levi’s. When I grew old enough to start caring about my own appearance, the first thing I wanted was my own pair of Levi’s. Mom managed to buy me a pair of gray ones. Just like her, my Levi’s made me feel good about myself, too.
Clothing can change a person’s outlook on life, no matter their situation.
The prison administration still permitted men who owned jeans prior to the ban to wear them, and I looked at them enviously. They moved with a sense of purpose and pride that I wanted to have.
A couple months after my arrival in prison, there was a riot that resulted in a lockdown and the confiscation of many pairs of jeans, making them even more precious.
Soon after, I was grateful when an acquaintance offered to lend me a pair of jeans to wear when my sister and grandma brought my kids to visit me for the first time, since I didn’t have anything nice to wear.
They were Bob Barker, not Levi’s, but I was in no position to be picky if I wanted to be presentable to my family.
Those jeans remain a “top choice for clothing and uniforms among America’s jails, prisons, mental health and rehab facilities, and juvenile centers,” according to the company’s website. It was better than the blue uniform pants with large yellow letters announcing “CDC PRISONER” — not the image I wanted to broadcast.
Those jeans made me feel a little more human. For a moment during the visit, I think my kids thought I wasn’t in prison, but rather eating out with them at some horrible restaurant.
When I transferred to California State Prison, Corcoran, jeans were almost completely eradicated from the population. They were scarce and valuable. Owning a pair gave a person a kind of status.
When my family visited, I had no jeans available to me, so I had to wear the prison blues. My aunt put her hand on my leg and, with tears in her eyes, ran her fingers along the large yellow letters on my pants that read “CDC PRISONER.”
The pants I wore made all the difference.
From 2011 to 2017, I went on a transfer spree, making long stops at four different prisons. Jeans had disappeared at all of them.
At my current prison, Centinela State Prison, I finally acquired my own pair of jeans from an old cellmate before he was transferred. They are a used pair of Bob Barkers. They still bear the manufacturer’s tag with the size and care instructions printed on them. The jeans have permanent creases and the blue color is fading, but they fit comfortably.
In January 2024, jeans returned to the package catalog. The move was made “to standardize the clothing options between men’s and women’s prisons” and “ensure gender equality,” according to a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesperson who spoke to PJP editors.
There are three jeans options to choose from. We can buy button-fly Levi’s or rinsed Levi’s, and a brand called PLF offers a pair of relaxed jeans. Each one costs $70, the equivalent of almost 2 1/2 weeks’ worth of wages. Most incarcerated Californians make less than 74 cents an hour.
We can’t wear them out to visitations and we’re not permitted to wear a belt with them. The Levi’s logo must also be removed from the back of the jeans to comply with prison rules.
But at least it’s an option again.
If my mom were still alive, I know she would have wanted me to have my own pair of Levi’s. Maybe once I save up enough money, I’ll buy some.
I like the PLF because it’s different. The nostalgia of the button-fly Levi’s reminds me of when I was a kid watching my mom squeeze into her jeans as she readied herself to party on a Saturday night.
For now, my old pair of Bob Barkers will do just fine.