I have been writing for the Milwaukee Community Journal for a few years now. Many of you know I was a Milwaukee Police Officer for a little over 30 years before I retired in 2010. I then took a job with the Milwaukee Bucks basketball team as head of security for 8 years before retiring a second time in 2018. I usually talk about a variety of crime related issues whenever I write. Most of my posts are usually about up-to-date issues but sometimes I also like to go back and discuss things in the past. Talking about my early days as an officer I believe are important at times and give people insight on how the department has changed or stayed the same. I entered the police academy in July of 1979. The training was tough, hard several months graduating in December.
Many white officers had relatives, like fathers, brothers, uncles, and others on the job who could give them a heads up on what to expect on the job. The same could not be said for most of us black officers on the job. This was a foreign, different experience for most of us. There were not many black officers on the job at that time. But the black officers on the department would take us under their wing and try to guide us along giving us advice when needed. The LOM, League of Martin, a black officer’s organization, was very important and really helped us a lot. I will discuss more of this off and on in some of my future posts about my career.
I don’t know if many of you remember but that first year 1979-1980 winter is one that I never will forget as long as I live. Those are the days when it snowed so much that the snowbanks were up to 9 to 10 feet at the corners. The snow was so bad that year they had to call the National Guard out to help the city out. City plows, you know the large garbage trucks, were getting stuck in the snow, and the National guard had to help pull them out. You could not pass on city streets because cars were stuck everywhere. Do you remember? In the area of 27th and North Avenue, in the vacant lots, they were stacking towed cars on top of each other just to clear the streets. Some were stacked 7, 8 and up to 10 feet high. Most of our squads were also getting stuck and we would have to drive to the corner of a block. Then get out and walk the rest of the way to the home we were going to. That is a winter I will never forget on my first year right out of the academy. But you know what we did pull together and survive a very tough time.
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