MIDLAND, Texas — Isidro Trevino, better known as Sid, has called Midland home for nearly 70 years. But before moving to West Texas, Trevino served his country as a teen.
“I was in the military first in 1946, 47, 48 right after the second World War and I had my military training in California and New Jersey, and after that they sent me to Germany as occupational forces and I was there for three years,” Trevino said.
After those three years passed, Trevino returned to Texas where he went to school, earning himself an education which led to a historic career opportunity: becoming the first Hispanic police officer in the Permian Basin.
“During that time that’s when the Midland Police Department were looking for a bilingual officer so through the employment office in Midland, they finally went down the line and contacted the employment office in south Texas and that’s how they got a hold of me,” Trevino said.
Trevino remained on the force for 10 years from 1953 to 1963, starting out as a patrolman and then quickly rising the ranks to detective sergeant, detective captain and eventually assistant chief. But in a time of racial tension, Trevino faced some backlash for his early success.
“Being bilingual you know we had some of the white officers you know, they were kind of jealous cause I was kind of young and there were some older police officers and they wanted to be the chief of captain of police so I had my obstacles that I went through with them. You could see the resentment in some of the officers and mainly because I was Hispanic and they were older and had many more years of experience but they didn’t have it up there,” Trevino said.
After Sid left MPD, he stayed in the Tall City and went into the restaurant business, opening up the Granada Club for 33 years before meeting West Texas businessman Clayton Williams, who offered him the job as chief of security of the Claydesta office building
“He’s the one that owns one of the oil companies here in town and he and I became friends years ago because he ran for governor at one time. When one of the officers, when he had a vacancy as a chief of security for Claydesta, he offered it to me and I took it,” said Trevino.
At the age of 93 Trevino is now fully retired, but don’t let the age fool you, he still feels good and is ready to fill out an application to work another job!
“Sitting home doing nothing, that’s not for me, so if you have an opening, I will go to work for you,” said Trevino.