Author Donald Mace Williams' extensive research into the camp and its occupants reveals that the artwork wasn't a gesture from grateful prisoners to their humane wardens, as some have thought.

NPR: On the High Plains, Stories of Migrants and Murals

These particular snakes are believed to have gotten their start in the Everglades through the well-intentioned, but ill-considered, action of a few Americans who thought they were doing the humane thing by turning their pet pythons loose in the swampy wilderness.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Snakes in the grass