GUILDERLAND — Joe Higgins was a gumshoe and proud of it. He had a wiry build, a gravelly voice, and a discerning eye.

As the longest practicing private investigator in the state, he had many tales to tell, laced with crime and intrigue.

He died on Monday, March 19, 2007, at Ellis Hospital in Schenectady after a brief illness. He was 82.

A former detective with the Cohoes Police Department, he lived in Guilderland and developed a close relationship with the Guilderland Police over the years.
"We’re all saddened by his death," said Guilderland’s acting police chief, Carol Lawlor, yesterday. "He was a good friend, a colleague."
She went on, "He had been involved in police work all his life. He was very enthusiastic about it".He’d hear something on the scanner and call us at home. Even since he was sick, he’d call to tell us something was going on and offer his advice."
Higgins did forensic photography for the Guilderland Police Department, Lawlor said. "His skills as a photographer were second to none," she said.

He had jobs as a staff photographer at the Times Union, the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles, and the Rockefeller Administration.

He was particularly proud of a canoe trip he took, as a Times Union photographer, following the Hudson River from its start in the Adirondacks all the way to its confluence with the Atlantic Ocean. He saved a scrapbook, its pages now yellowed with age, that documented the trip.

Higgins never made the switch to digital photography. He took great pride in the clarity of the shots he got with his 35 millimeter film camera.

He worked as a photographer for The Enterprise late in his life. His photographs livened the newspaper’s pages just as his presence livened its newsroom.
The paper received many requests for his photo "Pilgrims Progress," of a pair of Christ The King students dressed in paper Pilgrim bonnets, ready for their Thanksgiving feast.

He produced a stunning page of pictures documenting the lowering of the copper dome, made by WeatherGuard roofing, onto the new train station in Rensselaer.
His front-page shot, "Here Comes the Judge," showed a beaming Victoria Graffeo, an Altamont native, in 2001 moments after she was sworn in as a member of the Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court.
But Higgins’s forté was covering crime. Week after week, he captured criminals on film along with the police who brought them to justice. From murder to misdemeanor charges, Higgins shot them all. He even featured Nikko, the Guilderland Police Department’s German shepherd, among the crime fighters in a front-page spread: "Suspected ‘Booze Burglar’ busted.

Often, Higgins’s inquisitiveness led The Enterprise to cover stories it wouldn’t have otherwise. Once, for example, he brought in a picture of a man mired in mud up to his waist on the edge of the Watervliet Reservoir. He was fishing when a misstep left him stuck and he had to be rescued.

Higgins added that one to his repertoire of other stranger-than-fiction tales. He loved to regale friends with stories based on a rich and varied life — serving in the Army during World War II, raising championship beagles and hunting with friends, competing at archery and winning Senior Olympic championships nine times, singing and playing guitar with his band, Country Joe Review.
"We enjoyed all aspects of Joe," concluded Acting Chief Lawlor, emphasizing his humor. "His stories were always amusing. He was quite a character."

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Joseph P. Higgins was born in Cohoes, the son of the late William and Mary Frances Smith Higgins.

His wife, Karen E. Keefer Higgins, died before him as did his brothers, William and Leo Higgins.

He is survived by his daughters, Emilie Mary Caroline Higgins of Guilderland and Marsha Livecchi and her husband, Patrick, of Willow Spring, N.C.; his grandchildren Tara Bennett and Brian Livecchi; his great-grandchildren Michael, Jake, and Josh Livecchi, and Abigail Bennett; and several nieces and nephews.

Funeral services will be today (Thursday) at 9 a.m. at St. Boniface Episcopal Church in Guilderland. Arrangements are by NewComer-Cannon Family Funeral Home in Colonie. Expressions of sympathy may be made to Newcomerfamily.com.

Memorial contributions may be made to St. Boniface Episcopal Church of Guilderland, 5148 Western Ave., Guilderland, NY 12084.