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Bellefonte Police Department History
"An outbreak of arson and one of America's first Jewish mayor's brought about the formal organization of the Bellefonte borough Police Department on May 18, 1875. Prior to this time there'd been several unsuccessful attempts - in 1867 and 1868 - to formally organized a Bellefonte least force.
Bellefonte after the Civil War was plagued by fire set by incendiaries. Life and lamb were imperiled when a 16 man and volunteer police force was organized by the citizens in July of 1867. A borough budget totaling $15,000 that year made it impossible for the 2500 citizens of the community to financially sustained this force for an extended period of time and it withered away.
During this time the forces of law and order and they'll find consisted mainly of the "Chief Burgess," the famed Pinkerton detective agency and High constable, Charles Garner, one of the first Negroes in a Pennsylvania borough to be a left it took public office.
The wide scope of law enforcement faced by the town meeting impossible for the Chief Burgess, who got no pay, and the high constable, paid on a fee basis, to render the adequate protection the citizens demanded. An $850 bill presented by the Pinkerton agency to the town council brought a quick and that arrangement.
On June 1, 1868, Council tackled the situation head-on. By motion a four-man paid police force was organized "for three months." Their followed a long debate among the town fathers as to whether or not it was legal to pay policemen out of the borough funds. Five years later, on June 2, 1873, the borough solicitor ruled that it was legal for counsel to employ a paid police force. Another year when buying and finally, on July 9, 1874, counsel self to appropriate and annual some of $350 for a paid police force. A conflict personalities developed, thereafter, among the Councilman as to who and how many would serve on the force. Meanwhile, the arsonists continued their incendiary work. By early 1875 Chief Burgess Irwin became so exasperated he submitted the following message to the counsel:
"The time and trouble of the Chief Burgess Bellefonte and ferreting out and suppressing incendiarism in the borough onto receive some remuneration, his own stable having been burnt by the incendiaries while he was engaged in hunting them out."
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