Gary Petersen

Gary was born in Concord, CA and when he was 2 years old his family moved to Long Beach. Gary spent the next several years in Long Beach attending Long Beach Poly high where he played water polo and baseball.

Gary always wanted to be a cop so he enrolled in Criminal Justice at Cal State Long Beach where he attended for 2 years.

Gary had attended San Jose State for one year, when he received an assignment to take a civil service test. In the past he had surfed and partied in Newport Beach and he heard that Newport was testing; so while he was testing in OC he also tested at Newport.

He received a call from Chief Glavas offering him a job. He told the Chief, thanks but no thanks that he had just tested to fulfill a requirement for a class. The Chief told him that he would start at $392 a month. Although tempted, Gary said no.

He reconsidered the next day, Friday, and called the Chief. He took his physical that same day and started the LAPD Academy three days later on Monday. Gary’s training officers were Swede Nelson and Doug Dein. He spent 4 weeks in training.

Gary said it was the best decision he ever made. He worked CSI and Detectives, was promoted to Sergeant in ’68, to Lieutenant in ’72 and to Captain in ’87. While he was a Captain he worked all the divisions. Gary also was involved in the formation of the swat team, the explorer post and the department dive team. He retired with Bob Hardy in December of 1995 after 33 years.

Gary remembers working Easter Week when Newport was the place to be. He recalls driving down the street at night checking parked cars for sleeping Juvie’s. When he found them he would set them on the curb and tell them to wait until the patty wagon came by. He said they would just sit there and wait while he continued checking the street.

Gary remembers Bill Blue’s Hawaiian parties and going to the river with the guys. Gary always thought of the PD as a big family. Both of Gary’s kids were in the Explorer program and if anything came up about the explorers Gary was right there to help.

Interviewed by Stan Bressler

Gary and Terry now live in Pinehurst, North Carolina where he spends a lot of time on the golf course.

Speaking of Lt. Blue, the reason the bathroom at the old station was called the “Blue Room,” was that Lt. Blue spent so much time in there!!

One day, someone opened the bathroom door and threw in a lit fire cracker. After it exploded, Lt. Blue came flying out looking and sounding rather distressed (Or angry?)

Nobody ever “copped” out to throwing the fire cracker.