Washington State Patrol Marks 100th Year

OLYMPIA — As of Tuesday, Washington State Patrol will be in their 100th year of service to the state of Washington.

WSP's history traces all the way back to June 1921, when Washington lawmakers agreed to create a new state agency that primarily worked on traffic enforcement. When a decision was reached, 16 men were given three days of training, and on September 1, 1921 were sworn in as the first WSP patrolmen, though back then they were called the Washington Highway Patrol.

In the early days of the agency, those officers looked a lot different than they do now. For one, they had no uniform: instead they were given just a badge and a Highway Patrol armband. They also didn't drive patrol cars but were instead assigned WWI surplus Indian motorcycles. Officers would be deployed all across the state, sometimes alone, and would often have to carry camping gear in their motorcycle side-cars for longer deployments. In some cases, deployment could last for months.

In the early days of the agency, there were more horses than cars on the road, and less than a thousand miles of paved road in all of Washington state. WSP says the officers spent most of their time enforcing the speed limit (a new, and at the time controversial regulation), but also would be called to respond to forest fires.

Eventually, in 1924 the officers were issued uniforms, but it would be almost two decades before they were given actual patrol cars. Also different at the time was the badges the troopers wore. From 1921 to 1927 troopers wore a silver, shield shaped badge somewhat similar to a firefighters crest, before adopting the six-pointed star badge that troopers wear today. In honor of WSP's 100th year, troopers have been authorized to wear the classic "Centennial Badge" once again.

The patrol says they'll also be using their hundredth year to look back at all the troopers who have been killed in the line of duty— taking time to remember the lost troopers on the anniversary of their deaths. WSP says the first anniversary memorial will be September 3 for Trooper Gene Bolstamd who died attempting to save a drowning teenager in Long Beach on September 3, 1957. To date, 30 WSP troopers have died on the job.