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Transcript of full Julius O. Pearse interview

BY JENNIFER BARRIOS | jennifer.barrios@newsday.com

My name is Julius O. Pearse. The middle initial is for Otto, as I am known to a lot of my friends. I was born July the 6th 1933 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

[How did you first get involved?]

After being in New York for a number of years, I got involved with the NAACP. I was always aware of the fact of what was happening in the South as far as the civil-rights movement was concerned, and I had seen of course the images that came on television and reports about what was going on in the South.

In 1962, I had the opportunity to join the police department. My philosophy is that if you're going to make any change, particularly within the police department, there is no way you're going to be able to make that change from the outside.

My feeling was that you have to be a part of it, get inside the institute itself, where you can make any changes. Because I had seen the efforts that was happening in the South So I wanted to become a police officer and I thought I could make my best contribution being on the inside and being able to control some of the activity that was going on between the people and the demonstrators, the people that were making their voices heard in the struggle, and I could be there and make sure they were protected.

So at the request of one of the members of the NAACP, they asked me to join the police department. I at first wanted to join the Nassau County Police Department. But I just missed the first calling in Nassau County by 10 people. So they said, "Well, listen, why don't you join one of the local police departments?"

The one that interested me most was Rockville Centre, which had a large black population, and Freeport. I had some friends in Freeport so I spoke to them, and they said, "Won't you please come out and try to break the color line here?" So I waited and they sent a sergeant from Freeport police department to interview me. At the time I was living in Woodmere, New York, which is a predominantly white area.

So I guess the sergeant assumed with my address and my name, Julius O. Pearse, that I was a white. So they came to my door and he knocked on the door and I came to the door and I could see the look on his face, that he was totally surprised to see an African American.

So I invited him in and he gave me all the points on why I should become a police officer, and what was the benefits of being a police officer, but nothing about the benefits of being a Freeport police officer. And his last words to me was, "I guess you won't be coming to Freeport to be hired." And I looked at him, and I said, "Yes, I will be there tomorrow morning.

So I came to Freeport and I walked in the door and the desk officer asked me my name and I gave it and told him my purpose for being there. And the first words out of his mouth, he yelled back to some of the guys that were there, and he said, "He's here."

I went into the chief's office, introduced myself... He never looked up. He said, "You're Pearse, huh?" I said, "Yes." He administered to me the oath of the state of New York, after raising my right hand. Walked me downstairs to the basement, gave me a .38 caliber revolver, 18 rounds of ammunition, a gun belt and a badge. Walked back upstairs and told the desk officer to sign him in, he's in.

And I'll see you next week, I'll see you Monday.I walked outside of the police station with a revolver, ammunition in my hand, and a badge. And I had to drive back through Lynbrook to go to Woodmere, to my residence.

I became very paranoid at the time. Knowing full well I had to pass through Lynbrook, I had heard variable things that had happened to black folks being stopped in Lynbrook. So I drove under the speed limit, to make sure I obeyed all the traffic rules so I wouldn't be stopped. Because if I got stopped, here I am a young black man with a .38 caliber revolver and a police badge, how was I going to explain to them that I had just been sworn in to the Freeport Police Department? So I went home and I stayed there all weekend, never came out of the house, afraid that something would happen.

I came back next Monday and began my career as a police officer.

When I became a police officer in Freeport, I knew full well from the attitude of most of the police officers there, me being the first black police officer, it was very much on their minds.

And it was everything they could possibly do to make me violate the rules and regulations of the police department during my probationary period to get me off the police department, they were going to try to do it and I was waiting for it to happen and I prepared myself mentally to take all the abuse that they were going to throw at me.

Cause I felt that again, remembering what was happening in the civil rights movement and what Dr. King was about, I said, well he can take the beatings and the slapping around and the abuse, I can take a beating.

They used to use the word "nigger" quite often, and telling black jokes, and letting me know full well what they felt about me. So at the end of it, of my probationary period, I made it very clear to the police officers there that this had to stop.

I will not tolerate any more of their black jokes. I will not tolerate the use of the word... anymore in my presence, nor will I allow it to happen anywhere I was around. I guess they had a little more respect for me.

[Did you have moments of fear or doubt?]