Mike Pope is the second generation owner of Sonitrol of Butler County, a security systems company that has been in Hamilton since 1972 when his father purchased the franchise.

“My great uncle Chester Fee was a night chief of police in Covington, Ky., and he actually knew the man that started the Sonitrol systems,” Pope said. “My great uncle started the second franchise and for a number of years urged my dad to purchase one. Finally, he did.” Pope became involved a few years later in 1980.

Pope said his father, Jim, was also a chemist for the Atomic Energy Commission at Fernald. He worked there during the day and sold the security systems at night. But while many other franchise owners monitored the systems from their homes, Pope said his father enlisted the help of the Hamilton Answering Service to do the system monitoring.

“Alberta Pratt allowed my dad to bring his accounts to the answering service and they monitored them for about three years,” said Pope, adding that once they reached 70 accounts, the monitoring was done elsewhere.

The business owner would call in a code when they were closing up and the operator would verify who they were and then turn on the system, Pope said. And back then, the security was strictly an audio system.

“In the central monitoring station, each account had its own little box and you could hear trains going by and just whatever was going on around the city,” Pope’s wife and co-owner Helen said. “Now, the systems are all tied into several computers and a video screen pops up for video verification.”

Pope pointed directly to the video verification versus the audio as to how far technological advancements have brought the security business.

“The video verification will continue to be the growing part of this industry,” he said.

Pope, who left his career in the broadcasting industry to work in the security systems business, said he now has more than 2,000 accounts and 12 employees.

I really enjoyed what I did, but there was a lot of relocating with it and I wanted to be more stationary,” Pope said. “I really love this business too though. It was a great decision for me.”