Elmer Cooper
William Fields
On Oct. 11, 1965, history was made in Starkville.
The Starkville Board of Aldermen made the decision to hire two African-American police officers, integrating the city’s previously all-white police force.
The Minutes from the aldermen meeting show that following agreement between the mayor and police chief, Elmer Cooper and William Fields were hired onto the force. The two officers were hired initially on a six-month trial basis and paid a salary of $250 a month, a little less than $2,000 in today’s money. The board’s vote was unanimous, and both men stayed on the force for several years after, with Cooper retiring as a sergeant in 1990.
Starkville Police Chief Frank Nichols said looking back at the two officers was like standing on the shoulders of giants.
“It’s an honor, because I remember growing up, as a kid you would hear these gentlemen’s names a lot at the dinner table, just in general conversation, because they did break ground on integrating law enforcement here,” Nichols said.
Nichols said Cooper and Fields were respected both as police officers and as community members.
“They were more than just police officers,” Nichols said. “If you needed someone to come talk to your child, you could call these gentlemen, and they would show up and talk to your child - not necessarily arrest them or anything like that, but kind of talk to them and keep them straight.”
Nichols admired how they filled several roles in the community, replacing absent fathers and mentoring youth.
“It’s an honor to follow in the footsteps of these guys,” Nichols said. “If they hadn’t have integrated in 1965, without a doubt, I wouldn’t be sitting here,” Nichols said.
Former Starkville Police Chief David Lindley served on the department with both officers.
He described both as great officers, and said he could always count on either of them.
“They were fair people,” Lindley said. “They were easy to work with. They were good about mentoring younger officers. They helped with any race relations questions and/ or problems that we had at the time, because that was still a relatively new thing, to have black officers in the Deep South.”
Lindley said the community was generally accepting of Cooper and Fields.
“I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that we were a university community, and probably a little more open minded here than perhaps your typical southern location, but everybody worked really good together, and they were both good people,” Lindley said.
George Carrithers spent almost 40 years in law enforcement in the Golden Triangle, ending his career as Chief Deputy of the Oktibbeha County Sheriff’s Office. Although, he worked for a different agency from Cooper and Fields, he became friends with them early in his career.
“I was 21 years old when I got into law enforcement, and they had been there for a while,” Carrithers said. “They kind of took me under their arms and told me some of the stuff they did on patrol.”
“Good guys, good friends, I miss them both,” Carrithers added.
Cooper died in 2004, and Fields died in 1998.
Fields’ granddaughter, Charita Jones, was raised by her grandparents. She recalled her grandfather’s sense of humor, and how well he took care of her and her siblings.
“He was a jokester,” Jones said. “He could also be serious. When he was serious, you knew he was serious. My sister and I were daddy’s girls, so we were under him all the time. My grandmother was the tough one, but when it came to us he was a softie. He never liked to punish us at all.”
Jones also remembered his friendships with police colleagues. She said he would often reminisce with officers he served with if he came across them on the street.
“Sometimes we’d be in the grocery store or whatever, and he would see an older policeman that was still on the force, and they would literally walk up and start laughing and talking so loud,” Jones said. “My sister and I were so embarrassed.”
Lindley also recalled Cooper’s personality, and described him as easygoing.
“When Elmer was a patrol sergeant, he would let you do your job and respect the way you did it,” Lindley said.
He said both were very traditional, “old-school” police officers. Nichols also recalled how traditional they were, and reminisced about Cooper always keeping his hat on.
“Rarely did you ever see him without his hat on in uniform,” Nichols said. “A lot of times he was parked out on Main Street, and directing traffic and stuff, and he’d always have his hat on outside of his car.”
He remembered Fields as being a nice man, but very serious about police business.
“He didn’t play at all,” Nichols said. He was about the business of keeping law and order."
Nichols reflected on advice Cooper gave him not long after he was hired onto the SPD, telling him to enjoy being a police officer.
Nichols, who is the SPD’s first black chief, emphasized the importance of diversity in policing today, saying a department should at least reflect the community’s census. He said he was proud of how far the world had come since Cooper and Fields started on the force in 1965, but emphasized that there was still a long way to go.
“We’ve made some ground as far as racial issues go,” Nichols said. “We’ve made leaps and bounds of progress, but there’s still progress to go."