MADD 
Teddy Gannon: An article which first appeared in "The Reporter"
Good Guys Sometimes Finish First;
Sometimes They Finish First Twice
Teddy Gannon was born on Christmas Eve, 1935 at the former Homeopathic Hospital (now Roger Williams General), the second son of an anti-Semitic Irishman and a Jewish mother (Levine). With a pedigree like that, how could he miss? (Ask this rhetorical question with Yiddish inflection. Shrug your shoulders a bit, too.)
For "insurance," though, baby Bernard Edward Gannon made sure he had a protective big brother, who was six years older - and who remained six years older throughout their lives. Call him Captain John Gannon, former head of the PPD's Juvenile Bureau. Big John was on the job from 1954 to 1990, an illustrious career we shall chronicle another day.
Together in so many ways to this day, Teddy and John Gannon represent probably the most famous one-two combination in Providence Police history, leading by example, mixing brains with personality, guts and smarts. To their parents' credit, they have remained best friends and still socialize often.
Today, John is 74 and really retired. Teddy is Chief of Police in Burrillville, R.I., a town in transition, from Sleepy Hollow to Let's-Build-in-Burrillville. "We're trying to keep up with the growth," Teddy says.
Raised in an middle class East Providence home (their father owned a dental lab and their mother worked as a presser at Swiss Cleansers), the Gannon boys were inseparable as kids, and formidable, too: "I was one of the toughest kids in our neighborhood until my brother went into the Coast Guard," Teddy laughs. "Then I found out how tough I wasn't."
As a teen, Teddy grew up playing baseball, emulating his hero (Ted Williams) and dreaming about maybe someday making the majors. That dream didn't come true, of course, but others did. . .even though he was a good hitter at Hope High School. Not only did he excel in Class A competition on the baseball diamond, he captained the Hope Hign Wrestling Team as a 127 pounder.
All apart of the ingredients that would make him one day face down the toughest punk in Providence, Gerard T. Ouimette, now doing life in a federal prison.
Teddy had to be reminded that one day, as a patrolman, he walked confidently and alone into Beery's Café on Willard Avenue and there, in the presence of a largely Afro-American clientele, patted down the infamous Caucasian, Ouimette. Did we say he did it alone? Ouimette, an egomaniac sort of guy, must have been mightily embarrased.
Love At First Sight  
Gannon met his wife, Joan Maine, while he was working at a concession stand in Roger Williams Park. After angling to be introduced to this "good-looking girl," Teddy mustered the courage to visit her house. She was there when he arrived and so were her four sisters and five brothers (see Herbert Maine's essay). "I apologized and was going to leave because the Maines had so much company," he said.
"It's just that they all lived there. I never knew such a big family!" he exclaimed.
Lured by John's example, Teddy applied for and was accepted into the 21st police academy class. Graduating in 1958. One of his classmates was Jimmy Cain, who were previously featured. "That was a good school," Gannon mused, "but 1/3 of our class is gone. . .dead. Imagine that?"
Gannon managed to run through the minefield of office politics, making arrests and making friends. You couldn't help but like him. He even survived the "Colonel Stone Got A Ticket Story" even though he was Joe Bailey's boss in traffic.
Gannon made sergeant in 1968, lieutenant in 1977 and captain in 1981. In March of 1991, he vaulted over two respected majors (Teddy Collins and Mike Wilson) to succeed Walter Clark as Chief, a tough job he performed well for four years. . .four Cianci years. "Buddy Cianci was the smartest man I ever met. I mean that,"Gannon confessed.
"He never meddled in department affairs, at least never to any serious extent. If he wanted me to know how he felt, he often used Frank Corrente (now in federal jail for one of three "Plunder Dome" convictions). "Frank would say things indirectly, like 'Buddy would like this or Buddy doesn't want that. But nothing remotely resembling pressure.
"If the request wasn't wrong, I'd do it. But, compared to all the stuff I read, he didn't mess with me at all. I liked him, my wife and I socialized with him. He was a very witty guy," Gannon said.
After turning his chief's tin in 1995, Gannon - who had spent time in every division in the nearly 500-member department - decided to pack it in, a retirement that lasted only two years. "Jackie Leyden called me to say he had just done an evaluation of the Burrillville PD and that he would recommend me as chief if I wanted it. So my wife and I conferred. . .and I applied for the job.
"We've done a lot to upgrade the department," Gannon says proudly. "We have 25 sworn, a female sergeant, a female patrol officer, a special response team, a K9, a school unit.... We abolished the deputy's position, created Lieutenant's and sent two sworn officers to the FBI Academy."
Gannon himself is an FBI Academy alumnus, 107th Class, Quantico, Virginia.
Seventy-Two Miles a Day?
Does he find the 36-mile, twice a day commute from his beautiful home in North Kingstown tough and tedious? "No," he said, "I really don't mind. It gives me a chance to clear my head and reflect on what we did or I did that I could have done differently. Remember, I have a Jewish brain and an Irish face."
Gannon lives comfortably, he said, on a good PPD pension and a Burrillville salary of about $70,000. The job comes with a sleek new Crown Vic.
"This is a job I like because it isn't so big and unwieldy, you can't know what's going on in all the nooks and crannies. We cover three times as much ground as we did in Providence.
"People used to ask me how hard it was to be chief in Providence, under Buddy even. They sometimes ask about this job, too. 'How can you do it and not have a lot of stress?' they ask. "Well, what I do is nothing compared to what my mother did all those years when we were growing up, slaving away in the intense heat of that cleanser, coming home as wet with perspiration as if she'd just took a dip in the pool.
"Now that was a tough job," I tell them. "My mother - ask John - worked harder than anyone I ever met. Her job and her job conditions make being police chief a breeze."
When is he going to quit for keeps? "On that day when I wake up and don't feel like going to work. It hasn't come. Not even close, even on a winter morning. I like the work in Burrillville, and the people. And, of course, I miss the old days in Providence."
On a clear day, Gannon can see Prudence Island from his house, about a mile from the West Passage of Narragansett Bay. "It's only seven houses to the beach," he teases, standing behind the bar in his converted garage. He went through the whole house when he and Joan bought it in 1978.
"We replaced literally everything," Gannon shudders. "We still take some time to go to Pompano Beach every year with John and his wife. We've done that for the last 20 years or so. If it's April, you can find us sitting in the sun," he smiled.
Gannon became a cop after spending four years in the U.S. Navy aboard the radar picket ship USS Vesole (DD 878), working in intel ops. Luckily, he was deployed in peacetime and spent a lot of time in the Mediterranean with the 6th Fleet. He enlisted at (shhh. . .) 17.
Teddy and Joan brought four kids into the world: Danny is a PPD sergeant and head of the gun squad; Bernie Gannon, Jr. is a dick in charge of the auto squad; daughter Kelly is in banking (Washington Trust) and Michael ("Mick") Gannon owns his own hardwood flooring business.
We salute Chief Teddy Gannon. God bless.
| 
