BALTIMORE — Security officer William Groh will turn 79 next month, and he's still working at University of Maryland, Baltimore - where he first began in Public Safety since age 19.
Groh started at UMB a whopping six decades ago.
That's 1964, when the "Baltimore Civic Center" was only two years old, Lyndon B. Johnson was president, Martin Luther King Jr., visited the city, and "Harborplace" was still a gleam in the eye of Baltimore leaders.
The university's Police and Public Safety department just held a special celebration for Groh, who has clearly made the university his second home.
Groh, a Baltimore native, was a police officer for 30 years and has chronicled the UMB's police history, according to the university.
He watched it grow from 15 officers patrolling parking lots to a major department of about 190 employees. The university, which takes up the downtown west side, first got an armed security force in 1952.
Groh said in the university newsletter:
Crime in the city has always been up and down, up and down, up and down. But if you look at a map of the city that shows the crime statistics, you’ll see yellow, orange, red, and then there is a little green spot — that’s UMB, because we keep the crime down.
UMB Police and Public Safety wrote in their newsletter: "Dozens of UMB Police and Public Safety employees gathered to celebrate security officer William Groh and his incredible 60 years of service to the department and the University. The 78-year-old isn’t done yet!"
Check out UMB's profile of how much Groh has meant to the university.
