Word: precincts
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...smartly about Kevin White's headquarters, where smiling workers crayoned the ward-by-ward returns on a wall-sized chart. Unlike Mrs. Hicks' picnic-like celebration, where there was plenty of liquor and no charts, White's headquarters were marked by an exuberant but businesslike atmosphere. Returns from each precinct were carefully tabulated; charts showing the relative strength of each candidate in each important city district were being set-up and studied. There was no orchestra; there were no bars, no ham sandwiches, no sweet gerkin pickles, no chocolate cake for White's campaign workers--lawyers, teachers, students, high state...
Through an informant, police were kept advised of the League's activities. At 1:45 a.m. Sunday, the informant, a wino and ex-convict, passed the word (and was paid 50? for it): "It's getting ready to blow." Two hours later, 10th Precinct Sergeant Arthur Howison led a raid on the League, arresting 73 Negro customers and the bartender. In the next hour, while squad cars and a paddy wagon ferried the arrested to the police station, a crowd gathered, taunting the fuzz and "jiving" with friends who had been picked up. "Just as we were pulling...
...They Won't Shoot." When the trouble began outside Twelfth Street's blind pig, the 10th precinct at that early hour could muster only 45 men. Detroit police regard the dawn hours of Sunday, when the action is heaviest in many slums, as a "light period." The precinct captain rushed containing squads to seal off the neighborhood for 16 square blocks. Police Commissioner Ray Girardin decided, because of his previous success with the method, to instruct his men to avoid using their guns against the looters. That may have been a mistake...
...Hayes Homes housing development across the street and by other cab drivers as well. Out over the cabbies' crackling VHP radio band went the rumor that white cops had killed a Negro driver. Within minutes, cabs and crowds were converging on the grey stone headquarters of the Fourth Precinct in the heart of Newark's over crowded, overwhelmingly Negro Central Ward. By midnight, the first rocks and bottles were clattering against the station-house walls; by the next day, the tinkle of broken glass was counterpointed by cries of "Beat drums, not heads!" Out charged a phalanx...
...There seemed to be little call for the explosion in Newark, either. Nevertheless, after building up slowly, it spewed violence in all directions. After the first pop bottles and bricks were heaved, the looters moved in. Harry's Liquor Store, a fueling stop about a block from the precinct house where Cabby Smith was booked, became the first target. A brick smashed the unprotected display window; gallons of liquor poured out -into throats, not gutters. From other liquor stores, Negro looters formed human chains that reached clear around corners. They went first for the imported Scotch (Chivas Regal...