Bill Logan Shares His Memories of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Bill was assigned with his police department colleague, Henry White, to provide protection to ensure Dr. King was safe during visits at a variety of locations in Evanston – including a barbershop on Emerson Street, a restaurant, the Orrington Hotel and other stops along the way.

Dr. King gave presentations at the Unitarian Church on Ridge Ave. during his 1962 visit and at the First United Methodist Church on Hinman during his 1963 visit.

The officers accompanied Dr. King in plainclothes and an unmarked police car. “We met with Dr. King and his staff and told them we would be there to make sure he was safe,” Bill recalls. “We managed to get him in and out safely wherever he went.”

According to Bill, Dr. King was very friendly and supportive. “He talked and joked, but he was also very serious about making things better in our world,” he says. Bill says Dr. King provided advice to him which eventually changed his life: “I told him about the race problems we were having in the Evanston Police Department and he said that I should stay the course, hold on to my faith, have faith in myself, and be prepared…He told me that I could be anything I wanted to be, but that I had to be prepared and that education would be important.”

Armed with that advice, Bill enrolled in college courses and eventually earned a degree from Northeastern Illinois University – which he says was essential in taking him up the various rungs at the department and eventually helping him become Evanston’s first African American Police Chief.  His training included a stint at the FBI Academy in Washington, D.C. and additional management coursework at Northwestern University’s Traffic Institute. 

At the end of his visits, Dr. King expressed his appreciation to Bill and the Evanston police team, saying police departments in the south were generally less supportive – and actually in some cases sought to arrest him.

 Photos by Karen Kring.