NSW Police Public Call Boxes
The Police Call Box system was introduced into Australia by Commissioner Walter Childs in the 1930s. There were still some in use in the late 1970s.
Police on the beat (ie foot patrol) were required to ring in to their station and report (called ‘getting a mark’). This was noted on the reporting sheet at the police station by the Station Sergeant or Reserve Constable. It was used as a means of supervision and also
of relaying out-standing jobs to patrolling police.
The following article from 1947 mentions a member of the public making a call to police from a Police Public Call Box.
Historic use of telephones by police
The NSW Police Dept. Annual Report for 1890 contains the following paragraph:
“The use of the telephone for police purposes has been made more generally available in the city and suburbs during the year. Besides the twenty-five instruments at police stations, the telephones of the Fire Brigade Department are all available to the police, and, in addition, no less than 139 instruments in convenient situations, belonging to private citizens, have been kindly placed at my disposal for use when required. A list of the same has been printed and issued to each member of the force in the district.”
Police in schools.
I spoke to my son's teacher about how to organise a school visit by the police. They had received a visit just the week before. Each police station has an Education Officer and sometimes a Youth Liaison Officer who will visit schools and talk to classes about the role of police.
Mrs S said that the school doesn't specify what they want, the police have their own education program. For Stage 1 they use a biug book and talk about the different kinds of police.
I asked some students what they remembered from the police visit. One said "stop, drop and roll" but then he realised that was from the Fireman's visit. The types of police my son remembered were "swimming ones" and "disguised ones" (water police and undercover detectives). The children were particularly impressed that the police had real guns. Capsicum spray came into their conversations several times over subsequent weeks. This is the stuff that interests 7 year olds!
The class had to practice saying their home address for news. This tied in with what you would say if you had to phone "000" in an emergency. Another piece of homework was an activity sheet that looked at different styles of fingerprints and asked students to record the prints of 4 family/friends: a very inky business!
I visited Marrickville police to talk to the Education Officer, hoping to attend a school visit and/or view their education materials. I collected brochures and a folding police money box (used in the artefact). I also photographed patrol cars (with permission).
