Nierenberg, Jim
Part 1 of 3 was recorded at Jim Nierenberg’s house in Tucson, Arizona on May 2nd, 2018. It covers the following themes:
b. 1948
Childhood in New York City. Early experiences with police. Unintentional advertising career. Deteriorating conditions in 1960s New York.
Joining Air Force in 1966 and assignment at Davis Monthan in Tucson that year.
Loading Agent Orange on airplanes for defoliating operations in Southern Arizona.
Description of Tucson in 1966. Cruising, drive-ins, boondockers. Discovering Arizona. Social connections between Davis Monthan and the University of Arizona. Hitchhiking within city. Drag racing.
Air Force base life in the late 1960s. Race riot in barracks. Anti-military sentiment during Vietnam War.
Civilian attitudes towards airmen in Tucson.
Work at ASARCO in Green Valley in 1970. Threats from mining union.
Work as a mechanic at O’Reilly Chevrolet.
Connections and friendships with people in Tucson community during police years.
Driving Howard Hughes as informal TPD assignment during the 1970s.
Joining Tucson Police in 1970. Early years of career. Walking downtown and on the west side.
Tucson Police Department in 1970: few police, mandatory helmets and cowboy boots, no air conditioning in cars or portable radios. Cultural difference between older and younger officers.
Air force plane crashing into Food Giant supermarket.
Pioneer Hotel fire.
El Rio Golf Course protests.
Part 2 of 3 was recorded at Jim Nierenberg’s house in Tucson, Arizona on May 14th, 2018. It covers the following themes:
Formality of police department in early 1970s under Chief Bill Gilkinson. Relationships between street police and administration. Nierenberg’s arrest of police lieutenants breaking into City Hall to steal a promotion test. General lack of corruption in Tucson Police.
Detailed description of Pioneer Hotel fire.
Interest in EMT training and firefighting after being unable to help at fire.
Dealing with public drunkenness and Veteran’s mental health.
Development of TPD’s interest in officers’ mental and emotional health in the 1980s.
University of Arizona student protests. Mediating tension between different groups of students in 1970s and 1980s.
Park Avenue riots in 1970. Lack of communication between law enforcement agencies.
Neighborhoods and crime in the 1970s. South Park. Miracle Mile. Downtown. Far east Tucson.
Pizza Hut killings in east Tucson in 1999.
Increasing public concern about drunk driving starting in the early 1970s.
Emergence of modern domestic violence definition and procedure.
Split-second decisions, judgment, and managing emotion.
Dealing with guns, real and fake.
Early bullet proof vests.
Part 3 of 3 was recorded at Jim Nierenberg’s house in Tucson, Arizona on September 12th, 2018. It covers the following themes:
Changing scope and style of background investigations for police hires.
Increasing professionalism and dealing with unprofessional officers.
Technological changes over Nierenberg’s career.
Carrying a personal tape recorder for documentation.
Ways in which radios changed police behavior.
Increasing regulations and need to holistically understand legal process.
Motivation to serve public in 1970s TPD.
Experiences as a reserve deputy in Santa Cruz County and Pinal County in the years after TPD service.
Pima County Sheriff corruption in 1960s under Waldon Burr.
Dysfunctional relationship between City and County services in the 1970s.
Police-media relations.
Early interpretations of Miranda rights.
Diversity and integration at TPD in the 1980s. Difficulty in recruiting minorities. Women in policing.