Carole Pope

Carole Pope said that when she went to prison, she found her voice. She also found the purpose for her life—helping women coming out of prison transition back into society.

Carole was born June 18, 1944, in Alameda, California, the daughter of violent and abusive alcoholic parents. She was identified as a prodigy on the piano at a young age. The San Francisco Ballet hired her as rehearsal pianist at age sixteen, and she once sat at the piano bench with Arthur Rubenstein—one of her treasured memories. She dreamed of becoming a concert pianist, but in those days women generally had to move to Europe to pursue such a career, something her father wouldn’t allow. Amid escalating abuse, she emancipated herself at sixteen, left home, and went to work. She attended college, earning Masters degrees in music and German literature. She got a job preparing Masters piano candidates at a music conservatory in Kansas City, Missouri, and eventually moved to Portland. 

Her former life as a “quiet, unobtrusive little music teacher” ended forever when she went to prison for theft and forgery in 1977. She turned herself in a day later; the recommended sentence was probation and restitution, but the judge found her guilty on two felony counts, each carrying a five-year sentence to run consecutively. In reaching his verdict, he said she was “college educated and should have known better.” 

Carole stopped drinking the day she entered prison and was extremely proud of her 35 years of sobriety. She also found her true calling in life. While in prison she began to talk to the women about their lives. She learned that most of them were there due to problems related to drugs, alcohol, prostitution, abuse, and for killing their abusers. After gaining permission to use the law library in the men’s prison, she discovered that creating a law library for the women’s prison was required by law but had been ignored. In 1978 she sued the prison on behalf of the women, argued the case in court in prison garb against the State’s attorneys, and won. The prison was fined $3000 a day until they set up a law library in the women’s prison. She went on to become the first female inmate paralegal in the State of Oregon.

By 1981, Carole was terrified she had already become institutionalized and would be unable to survive outside of prison. She forced herself to take parole. By then the plan for a program to help women offenders was brainstormed and in place, and in many ways she considered herself the test case. Upon her release she got a job as investigator for a Portland law firm and used the money and the rest of her time to start Our New Beginnings (ONB). Carole wrote grants and eventually purchased a house in NW Portland that opened in 1984 and continued over the next 14 years as a residential and non-residential center for 3,000 women. About 100 babies were born at ONB to whom Carole became “Nana.” 

Carole was a fierce advocate for the women in ONB. The program provided a stable, supportive place to live as they began the difficult job of reintegrating back into society. The women obtained mental health, drug, alcohol, incest, and prostitution counseling; parenting classes; job, financial literacy, and other life skills training; and medical and dental treatment. She took them places many of them had never been—to the circus, ball games, and concerts—all occasions to “give them a childhood many of them never had,” explaining that such experiences also helped them learn how to parent their own children. Many women went on to college; several earned advanced degrees. 

The program’s 85% success rate matched the prison’s recidivism rate, and over time she earned the respect of many skeptics in the community, including lawyers, judges, and others in the legal, criminal justice, and social service areas who came to acknowledge her passion in fighting for what was right, her fearlessness in the face of power, her keen knowledge of the law, her fierce determination to level the playing field for women in prison, and the success of ONB. The program closed its doors in 1993 due to a breach of contract from the State of Oregon as more prisons were built and prison beds had to be filled. 

Carole won many awards over the years. She was honored with "Heroes of Humanity" recognition and was given the Sri Sri Ravi Shankar Award for Uplifting Human Values at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 2007; the Ruby Isom Award, Oregon Criminal Justice Association (2006); the International Heroes of Humanity Silver Jubilee Award (2006); the Coffee Creek Volunteer of the Year Award (2005); the Civil Liberties Award, Oregon Chapter (1991); Family Circle’s Women Who Make a Difference Award (1990); Newsweek Magazine’s Unsung Heroes Award (1988); the Claire Argow Award for Outstanding Adult Program Providing Services to Special Needs Population, sponsored by the Oregon Council on Crime and Delinquency (1987); and the Mayor’s “Spirit of Portland” Award (1985). Gene Reynolds, producer of M*A*S*H, came to Oregon to interview Carole after reading about her in Newsweek. He wrote the script for a TV movie of her life that was cast twice but never filmed due to two writers’ strikes.

As Carole’s health declined during the last 15 years of her life, she continued to answer hundreds of letters from incarcerated women (and men) asking for her help, usually regarding their children. In 2003 she co-wrote A Resource Guide for Parents Incarcerated in Oregon to help incarcerated parents with the emotional, financial, and legal issues regarding their children that arise as a result of their incarceration. 

Carole understood that women have unique caretaking and stabilizing roles in society. Incarcerating women can have a devastating effect, not only on the women themselves, but also on their children, families, and communities. In 1999, Amnesty International reported that 85% of the children of incarcerated mothers will offend as juveniles and end up in prison themselves. The percentage of women behind bars exploded 757% between 1977 and 2004, a number nearly twice that of the incarcerated male population during the same period (Frost, N., Greene, J., & Pranis, K. (2006). Hard Hit: The Growth in the Imprisonment of Women, 1977-2004. New York: Institute on Women & Criminal Justice, Women's Prison Association.

Carole Pope passed away on January 6, 2013, after a long illness. Her hope was that the idea and inspiration of Our New Beginnings would not die with her, that people would see the importance of fighting passionately for people often seen as “throwaways” in our society and fight for the creation of strong community-based programs that can help women transition successfully back into society in ways that incarceration can never achieve. 

For more information on Carole Pope and Our New Beginnings, contact the Portland State University Library Archives and Special Collections, Portland, OR.

Locate on Walk:

• Stage Wall (Left Wall), 1-13