Nov. WBLA Business Meeting & Luncheon Info.

WBLA's November guest speaker is Nat Glover, former JSO Sheriff, past President Edward Waters College and now author.

Striving for Justice: A Black Sheriff in the Deep South by Nat Glover is the powerful story of a young Black man born into a racist environment and deeply underprivileged circumstances who became the first Black sheriff of a major city in the Deep South since the Reconstruction era.

Nathaniel Glover was born in 1943, in segregated Jacksonville, Florida. At seventeen he unknowingly headed into an angry white mob and the Ku Klux Klan attacking young black protestors staging a sit-in at a downtown whites-only lunch counter. Known as “Ax Handle Saturday,” this harrowing encounter with racism would commit him to a lifetime of fighting for justice.

Glover joined the Jacksonville Police Department in 1966. He was named Police Officer of the Year four times, was promoted to detective, rose to sergeant, and was appointed the city’s first hostage negotiator. In 1995, Duval County voters elected him the first Black sheriff in Florida since Reconstruction. He garnered national recognition for his community policing, ban on choke holds, and de-escalation training. Then-President Bill Clinton and U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno praised his initiatives during a walk-along with Glover in Jacksonville.

He was a mayoral candidate in 2003 and served as the 29th President of his alma mater, Edward Waters University. He was twice nominated for the Historically Black Colleges and Universities Male President of the Year. The school’s stadium is named the Nathaniel Glover Community Field and Stadium.

He received a “Great Floridian” designation in 2016 for his dedication to law enforcement, higher education, and the city of Jacksonville. He was inducted into the Florida Law Enforcement Officer’s Hall of Fame in 2021.

Glover’s memoir, Striving for Justice: A Black Sheriff was released August 22, 2023, and available at www.strivingforjusticebook.com. In conjunction with Florida State College at Jacksonville’s Foundation, book proceeds will help fund scholarships for need-based students through the “Where They Will Shine Scholarship Fund”.

His book was also approved by Duval County Public Schools to be available in their high school media centers and classroom libraries of those teaching the African American History course to provide a primary sourced local historical context.