It was not easy for Atlanta’s first African American police officers

April 3, 1948, was the first African-American division of the Atlanta Police Department. This was used as a strategic matter by then-Mayor William B. Hartsfield to get more voted from the Black community. By 1947 one quarter of Atlanta’s Police Department where members of the Ku Klux Klan.

The Black officers at that time where eight men who where Claude Dixon, Henry Hooks, Johnnie Jones, Ernest Lyons, Robert McKibbens, John Sanders, Willard Strickland, and Willie Elkins and they a Life for these men would not be easy. They were not treated or respected like the white officers. To avoid any danger the eight men worked out of a local YMCA. The officers were only allowed to patrol neighborhoods with a large Black population.

They were given guns but could not use them. Black officers were not allowed to use any vehicles. White officers from the city continuously harrassed them by threatening and trying to run them over white their vehicles. Even though they were law officials they were still treated as regular Black people in the south. They could not sit in the front of the bus or eat in any restaurant. Black officers were not even allowed to arrest white people in the community. It was said that one white officer proposed a $200 bounty to anyone who would kill one of the African American officers.

By the 1950’s he police officers were able to use the same headquarters as their fellow white officers but would only be allowed access to the basement. Until 1962 black officers were given the right to arrest whites regardless of their social status.

In 1971 Linnie Hollowman was the first African American woman to be an officer in ATL.

It’s important that this is known throughout the world about the crucial treatment of Black people in America. Let us celebrate Black History Month by showing recognition to these eight heroes. I can only imagine the treatment they went through. Thankfully they didn’t give up and were not ran out of their positions.