Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2021 | Share The King family has been in Winter Garden for more than a century after Jimmy and Eddie Mae King established roots here. Many of their descendants continue to break barriers.
Charles Alexander King broke barriers in the city of Winter Garden when he was hired in 1967 as the first black officer with the city’s police department. He served his community of east Winter Garden and walked the beat until 1970, when he returned to his previous career at a paper factory.
King, a Winter Garden native and a U.S. Army veteran, died Dec. 24, 2020, at the age of 84. Born in 1936 to Joseph and Eddie Mae King, Charles King came from a long line of strong, community-minded men, including a grandfather who barely survived a severe beating by the Ku Klux Klan, said Charles King’s sister, Bernice King Duncan.