Find of the Month

Each month we highlight interesting, important, and odd items from our collection, along with the stories they tell.

Most recent Find of the Month

June 2026 - Police academy

The Police Academy Records (Record Series 6408-01) include pages from a notebook created by Howard E. Hartsfield when he was in training at the academy in 1952. The pages in Hartsfield’s meticulous handwriting note what he was learning in his classes, with the occasional hand-drawn illustration.

His table of contents gives us an overview of what the academy was teaching police recruits at that time. Classes covered administrative topics such as the organization of city government and the Police Department; the role of the FBI; parole and probation; Seattle’s traffic code, and the laws of evidence. Procedural instruction discussed search and seizure, accident investigation, patrol, interrogation, vice control, and how to conduct raids and testify in court. A section on first aid included handouts on how to deliver a baby in an emergency. The unit on fingerprinting inspired a beautifully drawn guide to fingerprint patterns.

Tucked in the notebook was a letter to Patrolman Hartsfield from acting Police Chief Frank Ramon saying that the director of the police academy had called his attention to “the excellence of the notebook” he had compiled. Ramon wrote,

The appearance and contents of your notebook are indicative of the intense effort on your part and has resulted in a very worthwhile and informative reference source for your entire police career.

City directories show that Hartsfield had a long career with the Seattle Police Department, being promoted to detective in the 1960s before retiring sometime around 1974.

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