CRIME FIGHTERS MARK 150 YEARS OF SERVICE
New Chimczuk Museum exhibit chronicles history of Windsor police
A shootout with horse thieves, a frantic hunt for a serial killer and a ne’er-do-well who got drunk on Sunday.
Artifacts chronicling the heroes and villains of Windsor’s history went on display Wednesday with the opening of the 150 Years of Policing exhibit at the Chimczuk Museum.
“The 150 years of the Windsor Police Service is the story of our community,” said Chief Al Frederick, who arrived at the event in a 1958 Chevy Biscayne police car. “We’re intertwined and we touch every aspect of this community throughout the decades, whether that be wars or crime and justice. I think it’s a unique exhibit and it certainly exemplifies a long, long history.”
Creation of the exhibit, which closes July 30, is part of the celebrations this week of the 150th anniversary of the Windsor Police Service. Staff Sgt. Ron LeClair, who spearheaded creation of the exhibit, started collecting items about three months ago.
“If you’re going to celebrate your 150th year as a service, the actual documents, artifacts and photos are what people can most connect to,” said LeClair.
“So I thought it was important that we have that available. And it’s not something the public can see all the time.”
There are documents dating back to 1863, including a committal warrant against a man for being drunk in public on the Sabbath. The offender had to pay the arresting officer $3 along with a $2 fine, or do 15 days of hard labour.
That is one of LeClair’s favourite items.
“The fact that we have a document from 1863 is very impressive,” he said. “There are stories with everything that go in here so it’s all, in my opinion, very important.”
The museum also offers a look at old uniforms, badges, handcuffs and photos of chiefs going back to Elias Willis in 1889.
There is a monument to Const. John Atkinson, who was murdered in May 2006. At the entrance of the exhibit stands one of the emergency police call boxes that stood on city street corners until the 1970s.
One wall is adorned with Windsor Daily Star stories about “slasher” Ronald Sears, an 18-year-old serial killer who terrorized the city in 1945 and 1946.
There is also a set of handcuffs that belonged to Abraham Nash, one of the service’s “early heroes,” said LeClair.
In 1887, a year after joining the force, Nash received a bravery medal for saving six people from the Detroit River. In 1905, he was shot in the neck by a prisoner he arrested for robbing a fruit vendor. Despite being shot, he chased down the suspect. Nash recovered and returned to duty. He later joined the OPP, where he found himself in a gun battle with horse thieves in Harrow.
Patrons can also check out notebooks from C.W. Farrow, who was an OPP officer before becoming the Windsor police chief in the 1950s.
Farrow was brought in to clean up the gambling, prostitution and police corruption that plagued the city.
“He was a very hard-nosed, determined chief who was very successful in cleaning up what was at the time a corrupt police department,” said LeClair.
One of Frederick’s favourite items was the Borkenstein Breathalyzer, trademarked by Robert Borkenstein in 1953.
“When I came on the job 32 years ago, that was the breathalyzer machine that we used,” said Frederick.
“Even though it’s in a museum, we used it just 25 years ago. Now if you saw a breathalyzer, it’s like a computer.”
If you’re going to celebrate your 150th year ... the actual documents, artifacts and photos are what people can most connect to.