I loved reading about how the blue uniforms got started in the other threads, but that's left me wondering something.
Why do so many city PD's wear blue, but county Sheriffs and Highway Patrols tend to wear browns or variations of that? I know it's not 100%, but it's very noticeable.
Thanks for any education.
In Ohio, Sheriff/Deputy Sheriff uniforms are dictated by law:
http://codes.ohio.gov/oac/311-1
Now why that color scheme was chosen was never told to me by the Sheriif's Office I worked for.
Formerly known as xpd54.
The opinions expressed in this post are my own and do not reflect the opinions or policies of my employer.
www.gunsnobbery.wordpress.com
And so are State Patrol uniforms:http://codes.ohio.gov/oac/4501%3A2-5
There again, I don't know why.
Formerly known as xpd54.
The opinions expressed in this post are my own and do not reflect the opinions or policies of my employer.
www.gunsnobbery.wordpress.com
Good questions. Down here in GA most of the County patrol cars are brown as well. I've always wondered why that color was chosen and why it was mandated (or at least seemed like it).
jlw come on in and 'splain it to us. I know you know.
It's likely a different story with each jurisdiction, scaling up and down; heck, consider why the NYPD's RMP's are marked "NYPD Police" and compare them to the Port Authority Police Department cars of recent era.
I would hope the brown was because in the country it might blend in better in the woods.
We've got it backwards here. Las Vegas Metro wears tan/brown and NHP wears dark blue.
In CA, police wear blue because it looks more professional then the friendlier tan uniforms a lot of P.D.s wear in the 80s. Two, it is more stealthy at night. Tan gives you away. Pretty much all PDs went back to blue in the early 90s.
Not all sheriffs wear tan and green. Orange County wears all green and some North County Sheriffs wear black. I depends on the sheriff I guess.
CHP wears all tan. I have heard there have been some request to change the uniform. I guess their commissioner (the chief) whats to keep it the same.
"You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life." -- Winston Churchill
C.A. P.C. 832
What first came to my mind was how we're usually so resistant to change. Why blue for city and tan for county? "That's how we've always done it."
If you knew you were going to be in a fight for your life tomorrow, what would you change today?
A lot of the traditional blue uniforms in police work are due to the amount of hand-me-down gear cities got after the Civil War from the Union Army.
An old LAPD newsletter I posted in another thread shows this. The whole "militarization" thing has been going on since the 1800s, at least.
Reply With Quote
