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The Minneapolis Police Museum recently visited with Retired Sergeant Jeffery Grates to learn about Fun in the Sun.

Fun in the Sun is an annual “Up North” event usually held during the second week of August.

It all began 50 years ago when members of the the Model City Precinct C-Shift rented a cabin up at Borden Lake Resort for a week of recreation and relaxation. Members of the C-Shift stayed in cabins there and also in their own tents and pop-up campers.

In the 1970s, waterskiing and volleyball were popular activities at Fun in the Sun.

Over time, the location of Fun in the Sun changed. Here is a glimpse of one of the cabins at Camp Holiday on Turtle Lake where the C-Shift stayed for several years.

Retired Sergeant Grates emphasized the friendships and camaraderie enjoyed by the Model City Precinct C-Shift and the also the conviviality of the annual event.

The Minneapolis Police Museum sends its best wishes to the Model City Precinct C-Shift on the 50th Anniversary of Fun in the Sun!

Top photograph from 1972. In back row from L to R: Dave Patton; Jimmy Lang; Steve Erickson; Jimmy Knutson; Dave Risfit (friend of MPD). In front row from L to R: Roger Gates; Jack Nelson; Harry Baltzer; Charlie Miles; Dayton Dunn; Mark Cassman.

Photographs courtesy of Retired Sergeant Jeffery Grates

Emma Louise Paine was born in East Smithfield, Pennsylvania on August 2, 1854. Her parents were Isaiah and Ruth Kingsley. In 1878, she married Horace Paine and moved to Elmira, NY where she lived until his death in 1887.

The following year, in 1888, Mrs. Paine moved to Minneapolis, to be near her sisters.

Upon arrival in Minneapolis, she began at once to search for meaningful work.

She was a religious woman and her beliefs led her to join the parish at Westminster Presbyterian and also to to become involved with the fledgling Women’s Christian Association (YWCA), the Sisterhood of Bethany, and the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU).

These organizations believed that Minneapolis needed a woman to address the special needs of women and children in the jails and courts. They formed a Police Matron Committee and put forward a petition to the Minneapolis City Council to create the role of Police Matron.

The Committee defined the requirements of the role and its own involvement as follows:

• The Police Matron would reside day and night in the Police Station
• She would have have under her care all arrested women and children – regardless of location in the city – and she would accompany each to court
• They would pay her salary of $120 per month (later, as the role proved to be effective, the City offered to pay for the salary but the Committee would agree only to split the costs as it wished to retain its influence)
• The Committee held the right and privilege of nominating candidates for the role and had approval over appointments

Although they were concerned about her lack of experience, the Committee thought that Mrs. Paine had the right character and temperament for the role and put her forward as a candidate for Police Matron.

Mrs. Paine served in her role as Police Matron for twelve years from 1889 until 1901. During this time, she assisted approximately 7,200 women and children in the jail and court. She was highly regarded by both the Department and the community.

In 1901, after the election of Mayor A.A. Ames, Mrs. Paine stepped down from her role as Police Matron and was replaced by Sarah Schaeffer.

Photograph of Emma Louise Paine from “History of the Police and Fire Departments of the Twin Cities: Their Origin in Early Village Days and Progress to 1900” (published in 1899)

Additional sources: Minneapolis Tribune of January 22, 1928 and of May 25, 1958

Did you know that in 1977 the most famous arena of play for gamers in Minneapolis was the Community Room of the Model City Police Precinct?

A game club called the “Old Guards” met there on Saturdays. Its president was Tom Zwirn. The “Old Guards” began setting up each Saturday morning at 10:30 and were ready for play by 11:00.

Any random Saturday would find 15-20 gamers and 4-5 referees gathered in the Community Room. A small group might play army miniatures at one table while a larger group would likely be immersed in the game for which the Community Room was most renowned…the game of Traveller.

Here is how Mr. Zwirm described the Community Room’s long-running Saturday game of Traveller to a reporter:

“Each player goes through the roling process (which is done by rolling the dice, so it is a little confusing). It gives him his role identity. It gives him his IQ, his various abilities, his branch of the service or nonservice. He may get ships, in which case he hires crews.

Once the character is roled up he hands the dice to his referee who describes the encounter, whether the character has seen anything, whether there is a star system there or not. The referee, having generated a scenario states the purpose, and you take it from there.

My purpose is based on H.G. Piper’s Space Viking and I start people out in four different areas of my galaxy. They go through what a spaceflight would be like – colonizing, organizing a planet, creating trade, and so on.

In general they are defending their borders and increasing the boundaries of their empire. So you keep on until you die or get killed. Usually, the guy who dies will role-in a new character while the game goes on and then join the situation at that time.

It’s not really a win/lose type of game. The whole game – to simplify – boils down to how well you handle a given situation at a given time. Satisfaction comes from the job well done. There are no verdicts from the referees. If the player is fairly well-versed, he’ll know whether he’s done a good job, and so will nearly everyone else.”

From the Minneapolis StarTribune of December 11, 1977

For more than one year, Chief Frank Brunskill had studied trends in police departments across the nation before a reorganized Policewomen’s Bureau launched in January of 1928.

At the head of the newly-reorganized Policewomen’s Bureau was Lieutenant Blanche Jones.

At its center were: Etta Tollefson who had been appointed Policewoman on July 20, 1914; Georgianna Sharrott who had been appointed Policewoman on November 11, 1914; Minnie Staples, who had been appointed Policewoman on April 2, 1914; and Florence Riel, a civilian clerk.

Chief Brunskill had partnered with district court judges and social service workers to influence the city to add money to the police budget to hire four additional Policewomen. While Lieutenant Jones and Officers Tollefson, Sharrott, and Staples worked through cases at the courthouse, the four new Policewomen patrolled department stores, dance halls, cafes and other places where young girls and boys congregated.

An interesting glimpse into the life of Policewoman Minnie Staples shows that her late husband, John D. Staples, was a Detective with the Minneapolis Police Department.

Detective Staples had been appointed to the department on January 26 1911. He served first as a Probation Officer in the Municipal Court. On January 1, 1915, he was made a Plainclothes Sergeant and then was promoted to the rank of Detective on August 16, 1916. He held that rank for the majority of his career. For a short time in 1923, Detective Staples served as Captain of the North Side Station.

Detective Staples retired on September 1, 1931. Sadly, only 9 days later while enjoying a rest up at his camp on Hungry Jack Lake north of Grand Marais, Detective Staples passed away from a heart attack. Detective Staples held four citations for meritorious work on the force.

Policewoman Minnie Staples continued her career with the Minneapolis Police Department well into the mid-1940s and it is believed that her work gave her a sense of purpose after the death of her husband.

Photograph of Minneapolis Policewomen from the Minneapolis Tribune of January 22, 1928
Photograph of Detective John Staples from the Minneapolis Tribune of September 10, 1931

Mrs. Bush meets Minneapolis Police Officers and other members of the Minnesota Task Force 1-Urban Search and Rescue Team during her visit to the site of the I-35W bridge collapse on August 3, 2007.

Photograph courtesy of the National Archives

On Friday, August 3, 2007, First Lady Laura Bush surveyed the wreckage of the I-35W bridge collapse with Minneapolis Police Deputy Chief Robert Allen.

That same day, Mrs. Bush also visited the Emergency Operations Command Center and met with volunteers and first responders.

Photograph courtesy of the National Archives

Do you remember the excitement of hosting Super Bowl LII in Downtown Minneapolis in 2018? And how fun it was to welcome visitors from around the world to the “Bold North”?

Planning for a safe Super Bowl took more than two years of effort by the Minneapolis Police Department.

More than 3,000 sworn officers from 60 Minnesota jurisdictions and 40 federal agencies took part in the event. Officers from Ely to Rochester joined the Minneapolis Police Department to keep Minneapolis and its 125,000 Super Bowl visitors safe.

Minneapolis Police Officers worked with members of 30 different constituency groups to ensure that protesters could safely make their voices heard while ensuring that transportation flowed safely and efficiently to and from and around downtown event locations.

And, as they always do, Minneapolis Police Officers focused on the day-to-day duties of their profession. Chief among their successes during Super Bowl Week was the peaceful negotiation and resolution of a two-day stand-off at a hotel on the University of Minnesota campus.

We welcome you to share your memories of the event!

Photographs from the “Minneapolis Police 150th Anniversary” book published by Acclaim Press (currently out of print). 

On this day in 1920, the Tennessee legislature narrowly approved the 19th Amendment extending the right of suffrage to women. Eight days later, on August 26, the U.S. Secretary of State proclaimed the amendment ratified.

It seems like a great time to chronicle the work of some of the women pioneers of the Minneapolis Police Department.

One early policewoman whose work predated the ratification of the 19th Amendment was Emilie Glorieux.

Officer Glorieux was appointed to the Minneapolis Police Department by Mayor J.C. Haynes on September 11, 1911. She reported to Chief Michael Mealey and had her office in the rooms of the Humane Society.

Officer Glorieux’s primary responsibility was the oversight of the public dance halls of Minneapolis. She was responsible for ensuring that nobody under the age of 21 be allowed into the public dance halls.

The responsibilities of her office extended beyond the dance halls and, like the majority of the policewomen of her time, she was often involved in preventing or addressing crimes committed by or against juveniles.

Officer Glorieux was in great demand as a speaker at various women’s clubs, university clubs and study groups.

On January 24, 1913, Mayor Wallace G. Nye informed Emilie Glorieux that he could not reappoint her to her role as policewoman because the law did not actually permit the appointment of policewomen. A bill was in front of the legislature that would allow the mayor to appoint as many as five policewomen but until that bill became a law Mayor Nye could not reappoint Emilie Glorieux as policewoman.

Articles and photograph courtesy Minneapolis StarTribune

On May 10, 1976, the Minneapolis Police Special Operations Division (SOD) had a chance to develop their rappelling skills.

The SOD members practiced at a five-story fire tower behind Fire Station 11 in Southeast Minneapolis.

The purpose of the training was to provide the officers the skills they needed in such a case where they were required to make a rescue or reach a suspect high in a building where the only access was from above.

The members of the SOD were joined in the rappelling training by their 51-year-old Captain Rollo Mudge.

Officer Jack Giebel, Sergeant Jerry Shanahan, Officer Jim Hovda and Officer Doug Madsen were amongst the SOD members who took part in the training.

Officer Shanahan was reported to have stepped out onto a window ledge, grabbed the rope, tilted his head back and walked right down the wall first one step at a time and then with big bounces once he got the hang of it.

Officer Madsen may have thought that it was a bit hairy going out the window but once he got going he had a lot of fun with it and wanted another turn.

The team was scheduled to train the next day on the Nicollet Avenue Bridge at Minnehaha Creek.

Source: Minneapolis StarTribune of May 11, 1976

Photograph from the “Minneapolis Police 150th Anniversary” book published by Acclaim Press (currently out of print). 

We found a gem of a document in the museum archives that we would like to share with you today. Here is a look at the vehicle specifications for a fleet of cars to be purchased by the Minneapolis Police Department in 1974.

As you will recall from an earlier post, 1974 was the year in which the black-and-white squad cars were replaced, for a time, with an all-white model. The squad car pictured above is the older Plymouth Fury re-painted in the all-white color scheme.

If you have a photograph of one of the 1974 models as described in the specifications, or have experiences of driving one of the 1974 models, we would love to hear from you! Please comment below or email us at info@mplspolicemuseum.org

Thank you!