Uniforms and counters · the firsts of the service record

1915 – TODAY

Police: Leah H. Reeder's survey in Frost Illustrated names Arthur Williams as Fort Wayne's first African American policeman, the second Oliver Lee, hired in 1919, and Laura Jackson as the department's first Black policewoman; the Smiley Collection dates Williams's own first to 1917. Morgan's study, writing of the postwar hiring, says that when the police department took on five Black patrolmen in 1949–50 "there had previously been only one 'colored' officer" — the three accounts together give the true shape of the record: isolated early appointments, a force still effectively closed a generation later, and a real opening only after 1949. The summit of the department came on 2 January 2014, when Garry Hamilton, who had joined the force in 1994, was sworn in as Fort Wayne's first Black police chief.

Fire: The fire service stayed closed to Black applicants until the 1960s. Richard Ridley Jr. was hired in 1961 as the city's first Black firefighter and served until 1985 — the same man who had been the first Black student at Bethlehem Lutheran School and Concordia Lutheran High School, whose family were among the first Black members of a Lutheran congregation in Fort Wayne. Marvin Eady, the second Black man on the force, applied in 1963 at the urging of a city councilman working to diversify the department. In 1979 Genois Wilson became Fort Wayne's first woman firefighter. The Smiley Collection styles Tim Davie the first African American fire chief. Counters and offices: The Smiley Collection's firsts run across the century — William Smith, the first African American federal employee in Fort Wayne (1915); Edna Roland Williams, the first African American social worker in Allen County (Morgan's study dates the welfare department's first Black social-worker appointment to the Branning years, 1949–50, without naming her; the collection names her); Lewis Sims, the first Black bus driver for the Public Transit Corporation; L. B. Jones Sr., the first Black male parole/correctional officer in Fort Wayne; William Hayden, the first Black bank executive in the city, at People's National Bank; Corrinne Mudd Brooks, who organized the first African-American Girl Scout troop in Fort Wayne; Verbie Walder, the first Black head high school football coach in the Summit City (1974); and A. C. Eldridge, the first Black head varsity basketball coach.

Sources:

1. Leah H. Reeder, "Your black history matters!," Frost Illustrated, 5 September 2015 (via ACGSI) — Arthur Williams, Oliver Lee (1919), Laura Jackson.
2. Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center, Marsha Smiley Collection — Williams (1917); Laura Jackson as first FWPD policewoman; Davie; Smith (1915); Edna Roland Williams; Sims; Jones; Hayden; Brooks; Walder (1974); Eldridge.
3. Iwan W. Morgan, "Latecomers to the Industrial City," IMH 95 (1999) — the five patrolmen of 1949–50 and the single "colored" officer before them; the welfare department's first Black social worker; fire service closed until the 1960s.
4. The History Center, "Fabric of the Fort" (11 February 2025) — Richard Ridley Jr., 1961–1985, and Genois Wilson, 1979; Journal Gazette (Terry Richardson, 16 September 2018) — Marvin Eady, 1963, and the councilman's urging.
5. Frost Illustrated (January 2014) and the Indiana Prosecuting Attorneys Council (2018) — Garry Hamilton sworn in 2 January 2014 as the first Black police chief; joined the department in 1994.