page_title: Treadmill
section_title: Treadmills for punishment
hierarchical_section_title: Treadmill / Treadmills for punishment
caption_attribution_description: English: Treadmill used to punish prisoners at Breakwater Prison (now Breakwater Lodge), Portswood Road, Victoria &amp; Alfred Waterfront This media shows a South African Protected Site with SAHRA file reference 9/2/018/0034/002/04.
context_page_description: A treadmill is a device generally for walking, running or climbing while staying in the same place. Treadmills were introduced before the development of powered machines, to harness the power of animals or humans to do work, often a type of mill that was operated by a person or animal treading steps of a treadwheel to grind grain. In later times, treadmills were used as punishment devices for people sentenced to hard labour in prisons. The terms treadmill and treadwheel were used interchangeably for the power and punishment mechanisms.
  More recently, treadmills are not used to harness power, but as exercise machines for running or walking in one place. Rather than the user powering the mill, the machine provides a moving platform with a wide conveyor belt driven by an electric motor or a flywheel. The belt moves to the rear, requiring the user to walk or run at a speed matching that of the belt. The rate at which the belt moves is the rate of walking or running. Thus, the speed of running may be controlled and measured. The more expensive, heavy-duty versions are motor-driven.
context_section_description: Treadmills for punishment were installed in 1818 by an English engineer named Sir William Cubitt, son of a miller. Noting idle prisoners at Bury St Edmunds gaol, he proposed using their muscle power to both cure their idleness and produce useful work.
  Cubitt's treadmills for punishment usually rotated around a horizontal axis, requiring the user to step upwards, like walking up an endless staircase. Those punished walked around the outside of the wheel holding a horizontal handrail for stability.
  They remained in use until the second half of the 19th century; they were like twenty-foot long paddle wheels with twenty-four steps around a six-foot cylinder. Several prisoners stood side-by-side on a wheel, and had to work six or more hours a day, effectively climbing 5,000 to 14,000 vertical feet (1,5 to 4 km). While the purpose was mainly punitive, the most infamous mill at Brixton Prison was installed in 1821 and used to grind grain to supplement an existing windmill which Cubitt had previously installed nearby. It gained notoriety for the cruelty with which it was used, which then became a popular satirical metaphor for early-19th century prisons.
  The machines could also be used to pump water or power ventilators in mines.
caption: Treadmill used to punish prisoners at Breakwater Prison, Cape Town
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