Alcatraz Island, which hosted its last inmate 50 years ago today, was also home to prison workers and their families who returned to the island this morning to mark the anniversary and recount their lives there.

Thursday is a red-letter day in the history of Alcatraz Island - the 50th anniversary of the day the prison closed. It was the end of one era and the beginning of another.

Over a million visitors tour Alcatraz every year, but a recent discovery has revealed another attraction that lives within the shadows of this historical prison: glowing millipedes of Alcatraz.

From NightLife at the Academy to free walking tours to Japantown and beyond, 49 spots in San Francisco that are new, newly transformed or underappreciated. Time to explore!

Alcatraz has more stories than its dark past as America's most feared prison. One part of its history is the Indian occupation from the winter of 1969 to the spring of 1971, when a band of American Indians seized the island after the prison closed. They hoped to turn it into an Indian cultural center, or perhaps a small university devoted to native studies.