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Inside the FBI highlights news, cases, and people from around the Bureau—in audio form. For more information, visit fbi.gov.
[A bright, marimba-driven track begins.]
Kira Boyd: This July 26 marks the FBI’s 116th birthday.
On this episode of our podcast, we’ll celebrate the occasion by taking a quick sprint through our history and sharing 16 facts you might not know about the Bureau.
I’m Kira Boyd, and this is Inside the FBI.
[The Inside the FBI jingle kicks in. It's a bright and driving track.]
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Boyd: Fact number one: The Bureau was founded on July 26, 1908. But we don’t celebrate that date as our birthday for an obvious reason.
Dr. Fox: July 26th is an odd day because the Bureau really kind of got going at the start of the new fiscal year, which back in 1908—when we were created—was July 1.
But not everybody had taken their oath of office, and not all of our agents were on board. And although things were working in D.C. and we had agents out in the field beginning their investigative work—or really, more appropriately, continuing their investigative work—it was on July 26 that Attorney General Bonaparte sent out a memo to all the U.S. attorneys and basically said, “look, if you need a detective, call Stanley Finch in Washington.”
Bonaparte created us as a small innovation to organize his investigators so that their work could be basically given where it was needed.
And we take that as our birthday because that's how we began.
Boyd: This brings us to fact number two ...
Fox: ...Day one was pretty much like days before.
Boyd: The U.S. Department of Justice had investigators for many years before the Bureau was created. Some of these were on loan to us from the U.S. Secret Service.
Others had permanent investigative beats, like naturalization and land fraud.
Fox: And we had a bunch of accountants who looked into white-collar matters.
But on July 1, what Bonaparte did was put all of those detectives together. And since we couldn't—by a congressional law—use those Secret Service operatives anymore, we hired eight of them permanently as special agents.
And, so, sometime in the middle of July, we had 34 special agents. We had an investigative force that was organized out of D.C., and we didn't have a name.
Boyd: That leads us to fact number three: We didn’t technically become the FBI until almost three decades after our founding.
Dr. Fox: When we were created by Charles Bonaparte back in 1908, he didn't give us a name. In fact, when he told Congress in the fall that he had done this, he said, “I created a small special agent force,” and he didn't even capitalize the initials.
In the spring of the next year, as the new President was coming in and a new attorney general was coming in, we were officially called the “Bureau of Investigation,” and we generally went by that name for the next couple of decades. Sometimes, we were called the “Division of Investigation.”
But it was in 1935, just after we had been dealing with some of the gangster threats, when our agents were given new authorities under the law and we were beginning to emerge into the public's consciousness, that Congress authorized us to use the name the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
At the time, there were several bureaus of investigations and divisions of investigation across the federal government, and we needed a unique name, and that's the one we got.
Boyd: Fact number four is that the FBI’s special agents are sworn federal law enforcement officers. But fact number five is that our agents weren’t always allowed to carry guns or make arrests.
Dr. Fox: Both of those official authorizations came in 1934, which was part of a package of crime bills that Congress passed.
One was the Federal Firearms Act, which included a provision authorizing us to carry weapons and to basically pay for them and train our agents in their use. And the other was authorizing our agents to make arrests as federal agents.
Before that, we often had to use local police or a U.S. marshal. Sometimes our agents could make a citizen's arrest depending on what was going on.
They could carry firearms at times, but the Bureau wasn't allowed to buy lots of them, it wasn't allowed to supply its agents with them, and it didn't offer any formal training in 'em.
That all changed in the spring of 1934, and it’s why we ended up starting to develop Academy facilities down at Quantico, because they offered us the use of their firearms ranges and help with training. And, very quickly, it became legend.
Boyd: That brings us to fact number six: The FBI Academy calls Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, home.
Dr. Fox: The FBI Academy grew up at Quantico because when we were given authority to finally train and arm our agents, we needed to find firearms ranges, and the best ones to use were often found either with some of the larger police forces or with our military.
The Marine Corps generously allowed us to use some of their facilities.
And we quickly realized that those training fields were great for training infantry. They weren't so good for training police. We needed something a little more customized.
And, so, generously, the Marine Corps allowed us to build some firearms ranges for our use on the campus.
And because we had both our own agents and, after 1935, U.S. police officers coming in for the FBI National Academy needing this training, we were allowed to build an Academy building down at Quantico.
And so, since 1940, we had not only firearms ranges, but also an Academy building with dormitory space and cafeteria and so forth.
Boyd: And as the Bureau and its police training grew, the FBI needed more space.
Dr. Fox: And in the late 1960s, Congress budgeted us with money to build a new campus, and the Marine Corps stepped up again and generously let us use a significant parcel of land on the actual Quantico base.
And that's where we built our FBI Academy, our Hogan's Alley, and, eventually, a whole bunch of other facilities there, as well. And we have been very grateful and very closely connected with the Marine Corps throughout our history because of these sorts of things.
Boyd: This discussion of facilities brings to fact number seven: Our main Headquarters—the J. Edgar Hoover Building—is located at 935 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest in Washington, D.C.
But fact number eight? That wasn’t always the case.
Dr. Fox: When we began in 1908, our Headquarters was up kind of north of the White House on K Street. Over time, we have occupied various buildings, some of which included the main offices of the Department of Justice.
From 1934 until 1975, we were actually across Pennsylvania Avenue from where FBI Headquarters is today, in what's now called the Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice headquarters.
Starting in the late 1960s, we were authorized, basically, to build a new facility. Given the prominence of the FBI and the desire to keep our functions in D.C., it was decided to build at 935 Pennsylvania Avenue.
We started moving in in late 1974, and we actually dedicated the space in 1975, and we've been there ever since.
Boyd: That leads us to fact number nine: The FBI’s Headquarters facilities also include our presence at Quantico; our Criminal Justice Information Services Division in Clarksburg, West Virginia; and our facilities in Huntsville, Alabama.
Now that we’re more than halfway through our historical journey, let’s discuss FBI tradition and heraldry.
[A new musical track begins, featuring guitar, keys, percussion, and synthesizers. It feels somber, but hopeful, and repeats once more through the end of the episode.]
Fact number 10 is that the Bureau’s official motto dates back to the late 1930s.
Dr. Fox: It was created by a supervisory special agent named [L.] Drane Lester. He wrote a short piece explaining that with our new name—“FBI” or “Federal Bureau of Investigation”—that our watchword should be “fidelity, bravery, and integrity,” because it described the work that we do and how we should do it.
Boyd: Fact Number 11 is that the FBI seal, as we know it today, also dates back to the late ‘30s.
Dr. Fox: We had an initial one that was based largely on the Department of Justice seal and just had the words “Federal Bureau of Investigation” under it. But a more unique one was created with the colors of the seal—the blue and the gold, especially—and a more unique design. And, so, by 1939, we were using it regularly.
Boyd: Facts number 12 is that the Bureau grew tremendously in response to World War II.
Dr. Fox: In 1934, when we confronted John Dillinger at the Biograph [Theater] in Chicago, we had about 650 people in the Bureau.
By 1944—10 years after Dillinger's death—we were at 14,000.
That's a significant increase. It meant that we had brought in lots more professional staff. We needed people to work identification, we needed people to work records, we needed people to conduct record searches and to type up all the various memos and everything else.
We also needed more agents, and we actually started sending undercover agents to South and Central America because, in 1940, we didn't know what the Nazis were doing down there.
We had no CIA—that wouldn't be created until 1947.
We had no OSS—the Office of Strategic Services, which is often looked to as the CIA's predecessor. That was 1942.
So, the FBI took up that task and started sending undercover people to South and Central America to gather that necessary intelligence.
Boyd: 2024 marks a major Bureau anniversary. And that’s fact number 13.
Dr. Fox: We are celebrating the 100th anniversary this year of our fingerprint identification program, which began back at the start of fiscal year 1925.
Boyd: But fact number 14 is that that anniversary isn’t the only one. This year, the Bureau is also celebrating:
— The 50th anniversary of the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Center, which we profiled on a recent episode of our show;
— The 40th anniversary of the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime, which is based at the FBI Academy at Quantico; and
— The 10th anniversary of the FBI’s Next-Generation Identification system reaching full operational capacity. You can read more about the system at fbi.gov/ngi.
Boyd: Fact number 15 is that 2024 also marks 100 years since J. Edgar Hoover took the reigns of the FBI. And, finally, fact number 16 is that he technically first did so as acting director.
As Dr. Fox explains...
Dr. Fox: At the time, Hoover was a civil service appointee in the Department of Justice, and he was the number-two guy in charge of the Bureau already.
He had a reputation as a hard worker, as a talented bureaucrat.
Boyd: Then-Attorney-General Harlan Fisk Stone appointed Hoover to the acting role.
Dr. Fox: By December of 1924, he was appointed Director. Now, of course, neither of them suspected he'd serve for almost 48 years after that.
But that's our history.
Boyd: Visit fbi.gov/history to learn more about the Bureau’s dynamic story, from its founding in 1908 until today.
This has been another production of Inside the FBI. You can follow us on your favorite podcast player, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube. You can also subscribe to email alerts about new episodes at fbi.gov/podcasts.
I’m Kira Boyd from the FBI’s Office of Public Affairs. Thanks for tuning in.