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More than retirement in picture for GPD's Hanlon
A dozen photos loosely attached to a white posterboard tell the story of Mike Hanlon -- from baby picture to his last formal shot as a Greencastle City Police captain.
Friends, family and co-workers delighted in stopping, smiling and staring at those 12 stages of Mike Hanlon Wednesday afternoon as his retirement reception unfolded at City Hall.
There's an action shot of high school track star Hanlon, whose 10.6-second best in the 100-yard dash set a blistering pace back in the day. There's his "dreamy" 1981 Greencastle High School senior photo.
And Capt. Hanlon himself, now 52 and leaving GPD after 30 years and six months, couldn't resist pointing out his very first GPD shot, complete with full mustache.
"That was the Tom Selleck era," he laughed in reference to the mustachioed TV private eye.
There's even a graduation shot with his parents, Gary and Joyce Hanlon. And another in GPD uniform hugging his mother.
Truth be told, Joyce Hanlon never really wanted her son to be a police officer.
"Probably the happiest person in this room today is your mom," Mayor Sue Murray suggested to Hanlon as a brief program began.
Apparently Hanlon wanted to be a Conservation Officer, which seems only natural with his love of the outdoors and his interest in fishing and canoeing and more, punctuated by a retirement gift of a new rod and reel. But the timing just wasn't right.
And his mom, the mayor added, was "probably not real excited that a conservation job wasn't open at the time."
Instead, Hanlon joined GPD and forged a lengthy career despite a couple on-the-job injuries and a serious bout with Hodgkin's disease back in 1987.
"He never gave up, he's a fighter," Police Chief Tom Sutherlin, who has spent his entire 24-year police career alongside Hanlon, told the retirement reception audience.
Fellow officer Det. Randy Seipel would readily agree.
Seipel, who has been with the department 28 years and will be its most senior member when Terry Eastham and Albert Epple follow Hanlon into retirement over the next few months, recalled working the night shift with Capt. Hanlon his first nine years.
"Mike was always pulling shenanigans at the end of the shift," Seipel said, noting that one early morning they were about to get off and go to breakfast when Hanlon said he wanted to check out a suspicious vehicle behind the then-Walden Inn.
"I was like, 'Come on, Mike, it's time to go to The Monon.'"
But Hanlon dutifully went over to Seminary and Vine streets and the suspicious vehicle pulled out right in front of him.
"I saw who it was," Hanlon said, "and I knew he had a suspended license."
So that gave him probable cause to stop the suspect, who had reportedly been selling drugs in the area.
Meanwhile, Seipel headed that way too, only to find Hanlon and the doped-up suspect engaged in hand-to-hand combat.
Hanlon said he could see the suspect look one way and put his cigarette lighter in his other hand and reach for his gun, and he knew things were about to get serious.
"The fight was on," Capt. Hanlon said, noting that they struggled for four or five minutes before Seipel arrived.
"I look over and Mike's in a fight," Seipel said, "and he yells to me that he'd just taken a gun from the guy."
Seipel jumped in the fray as well, and "we were in the fight of our lives," the detective said.
The suspect twice grabbed hold of Seipel's weapon during the struggle in which Hanlon ended up hitting the man over the head with his handcuffs.
Despite about passing out from the ordeal, Hanlon got the upper hand and he and Seipel subdued the criminal and ended up in an ambulance themselves.
"It was the fight of our lives," Hanlon agreed, echoing Seipel's earlier remark.
Ever since then, Seipel said, "he and I have always shared a bond because of what happened that night."
Hanlon, who has already begun a second career working security for Hendricks Regional Health at Danville, recalled another memorable incident in which he and volunteer firefighter Chuck Wood responded to a house fire on West Columbia Street (right behind Bumgardner's Auto Repair) even before a fire truck had rolled.
"Somebody said that an elderly lady lived there," he said of the two-story residence that burned to the ground.
The smoke and flames were already bad and Hanlon and Wood knew they had to act, and quickly.
"He and I crawled on our hands and knees," he recalled, "and in the front room on the right, we could see her on the bed. The smokeline was hanging just above her head as we crawled in there."
Hanlon and Wood woke the woman up and dragged her to safety.
Moments later the smokeline sank to the floor and the two-story house went up in flames.
"It burnt to the ground real fast," Hanlon said. "If we hadn't gotten there when we did, she'd have been gone."
On Wednesday, the retirng Hanlon was presented a gold badge, which Chief Sutherlin said he can carry anywhere he goes.
"In my heart," he said, "he's still a police officer.
"For 30 years he's been putting on a badge and gun and protecting our community," Chief Sutherlin said. "We want to thank him for that."
Hanlon said what amazes him is how fast it all went from being the new kid on the block to the senior member of the department.
"It's been a real pleasure working with the guys I work with," he said, looking around the room to see current officers as well as retirees Sonny Wood, Paul Wilson, Carol Deom and Don Rumley, along with onetime fellow officer Scott Fitzsimmons.
"You made my career fun and exciting. I'll miss it. I'll miss you guys."
But like the officer's mother, his dad is happy to see that career come to a safe end.
"I am so happy he's out of the police force," Gary Hanlon said. "It's a dangerous world out there. I don't think people realize what you (police officers) have to do. I have so much respect for all you guys who protect and serve. Stay safe."