(SALT LAKE CITY) -- At an age when most of his peers are thinking about retirement, Harry Jackson is just starting out.
The police academy “rookie” will be 65 by the time he completes a 20-week Utah Peace Officers Standards and Training course in March - likely making him the oldest cadet to go through police training in Utah.
“I’m definitely not ready for the rockin’ chair,” Jackson said Monday.
Jackson, who underwent quintuple bypass heart surgery last year, spent 10 years on active duty in the U.S. Navy and 17 years with the Naval Reserve.
“I really expected some people to laugh at me, or say, ‘You’re crazy,”’ Jackson said. Instead, classmates describe Jackson as a “hard worker,” and an “animal.”
“He’s one of the most determined people here,” Elyse Charter said.
Jackson earns a living as a boiler pressure vessel inspector for an insurance company but wants to join a small town police department upon graduation.
“It’s just something I’ve always wanted to do,” he said. “I think there’s still time for me to make a difference.”
(iSyndicate; The Telegraph Herald; Nov. 16, 2000) Terms and Conditions: Copyright(c) 2000 LEXIS-NEXIS, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights Reserved.