Joseph ‘Joe’ McManamon served as a lieutenant in the Navy in the South Pacific during World War II and after returning from deployment, worked for the Cleveland Police Department as a homicide detective and an instructor at the Police Academy while also attending Cleveland-Marshall Law School. He worked in private practice with his wife, the Honorable Ann McManamon (1950), for almost 20 years before serving as the civilian head of the police and fire departments as Cleveland’s safety director from 1968-1970. He was active in the civil rights movement during the 1960s and worked to elect Carl Stokes as Mayor of Cleveland in the face of extreme bigotry, including death threats. He began his career on the bench in 1977, serving first on the Cleveland Municipal Court and then on the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas until retiring in 1993.