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City and County of Denver Dept. of Safety and Excise Police Dept. Records

 Collection
Identifier: WH931

Scope and Contents

The collection dates between 1900 and 1982 and contains primarily Denver Police dockets and Denver Police Surgeon's dockets.

The police dockets serve mainly as daily logs of incidents requiring police response and include the name of the officer on duty, the date, time, location, and description of an incident; names and descriptions of individuals involved (sometimes including race/ethnicity, gender, and/or marital status), and actions taken by the police.

Denver Police Surgeon's dockets also act as daily logs of incidents requiring medical attention. The dockets document the date, time, location, and description of the incident; injuries and/or diseases present; names and descriptions of individuals involved (sometimes including race/ethnicity, gender, and/or marital status); the name of the medical institution where individuals were sent; and a signature of the employee recording.

The collection also includes scrapbooks containing police-related newspaper clippings, traffic order requisitions, b/w photographs of 1970s police vehicles, a police laboratory book, Denver Police Academy's Manual of Criminal Evidence(1949), and Whitten C. Steele's 1938 Denver Police Department training materials.

Dates

  • 1900-1982

Conditions Governing Access

The collection is open for research.

Copyright

All requests for permission to publish, reproduce, or quote from material in the collection should be discussed with the appropriate librarian or archivist. Permission for publication may be given on behalf of the Denver Public Library as the owner of the physical item. It is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which also must be obtained by the customer. The Library does not assume any responsibility for infringement of copyright or publication rights of the manuscript held by the writer, heirs, donors, or executors. Reproduction restrictions are decided on a case-by-case basis.

Biographical / Historical

Officially established by city charter in 1861. In 1891 a metropolitan police system was established under a board of commissioners appointed by the governor. In 1901 the department was returned to municipal control by the adoption of a home rule amendment.

Extent

12 Boxes (11.25 linear ft.)

34 oversize folios

5 Volumes

Language of Materials

English

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Gift, Lt. Mike Morahan, Captain Gary Graham, City and County of Denver, 1985, 1989, 2007, 2008. Gift, Nancy O'Neal Campbell, 2023.

File Plan

One volume, police surgeon 9/4/1951-1/1/1952 returned as a permanent loan to the Denver Police Dept. in 1985.

General

Catalog record based on preliminary inventory.

General

Collection includes former C Photo Collection 241.

Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin

Repository Details

Part of the Denver Public Library, Western History and Genealogy Repository

Contact:
10 W. 14th Ave. Pkwy
Denver CO 80204 United States