--- title: Women in the Police Force: Amazing Early Photographs description: Women in the early 20th century pushed against the idea that police work was for men canonical: https://time.com/4300699/early-women-police-detectives-gallery/ author: Erika Janik article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-04-26T14:30:14.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:02:01.031Z article:section: History og:title: Women in the Police Force: Amazing Early Photographs og:description: Women in the early 20th century pushed against the idea that police work was for men og:url: https://time.com/4300699/early-women-police-detectives-gallery/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt078cf64144bc53d2/69888fe4cf40a858acc42e5e/160420-pistols-and-petticoats-05.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Motorcycle cops og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Women in the Police Force: Amazing Early Photographs twitter:description: Women in the early 20th century pushed against the idea that police work was for men twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt078cf64144bc53d2/69888fe4cf40a858acc42e5e/160420-pistols-and-petticoats-05.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # See Amazing Early Photos of Some of America's First Policewomen > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: Watch: Police Officer Teaches 11-year-old Homeless Girl How to Play Hopscotch [Watch (HLS stream): Watch: Police Officer Teaches 11-year-old Homeless Girl How to Play Hopscotch](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/69NX8Fgk.m3u8) (1:33)  _Published 2016-04-01_ by [Erika Janik](https://time.com/author/erika-janik/) ## Erika Janik Apr 26, 2016 2:30 PM UTC  Three motorcycle officers with the LAPD are on duty in 1927\. From left to right: Miss Hildur Fleming; Miss Myra Richardson,; and Miss Beryl Wilson. Three motorcycle officers with the LAPD are on duty in 1927\. From left to right: Miss Hildur Fleming; Miss Myra Richardson,; and Miss Beryl Wilson. Herald Examiner Collection, Los Angeles Public Library by [Erika Janik](https://time.com/author/erika-janik/) ## Erika Janik Apr 26, 2016 2:30 PM UTC On Sept. 10, 1910, Alice Stebbins Wells took the oath to join the 350-member, all-male Los Angeles Police Department. Wells stood a little over five feet tall. She wore no uniform, carried no weapon and usually kept her badge stuffed in her pocketbook. Wells hadn’t been given the position. She’d lobbied hard for her post. “It was a man’s world,” she later recalled of the day. It still is. Although television and fiction would have you think there is a woman homicide detective in every police department in America, only 15% of homicide detectives are women. Real women have fared far worse professionally than their fictional sisters, even a century after women joined the force. Women had worked as police officers and detectives before Wells, but few were as public and outspoken as she was in favor of the hiring of policewomen. Those women who did manage to join the force in the early 20th century had limited duties, confined primarily to protecting women and children from prostitution and pickpockets. They also faced constant harassment and abuse and extra scrutiny from those who believed that law enforcement was no place for a woman. [_Get your history fix in one place: sign up for the weekly TIME History newsletter_](http://time.com/newsletter) Private detective work was more welcoming to women. The first known female sleuth worked for famed private eye Allan Pinkerton and became one of his most trusted agents in the 1860s, known for her daring and talent for disguise. Women solved bigger, more high profile crimes as private eyes than as public servants. The same was and is true on the page, where more fictional female detectives work as contractors for hire or for private agencies than city police. That certainly didn’t stop women from fighting to join the police force. Two years into her job, Alice Wells asserted that she was doing everything she could to further the cause of policewomen. But, she conceded, “all one woman can do is very little. She can but find the needs and point the way. Where she leaves off many women may begin and do much toward the betterment of social conditions.” It’s a journey to “betterment” that women are still undertaking, within the pages of detective novels and in life.  Beacon _These images of women officers are featured in the new book,_ [Pistols and Petticoats: 175 Years of Lady Detectives in Fact and Fiction](http://www.beacon.org/Pistols-and-Petticoats-P1195.aspx) _(Beacon Press) by Erika Janik._  Detective Allan Pinkerton (sitting on the right) at Antietam during the Civil War. Standing behind Pinkerton holding the tent pole is believed to be Kate Warne, the first female detective in America, dressed as a man. Civil War Glass Negative Collection, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress  Many people could not even imagine what a female police officer would look like so this Ohio suffragette demonstrated what a policewoman would look like making an arrest. George Grantham Bain Collection, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress  The primary duty of policewomen was to prevent delinquency among young girls on city streets. National Photo Company Collection, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress  Ten women joined the Chicago police department in 1913\. They are (left to right) Mrs. Anna Loucks, Miss Clara Olsen, Miss Fannie Willsey, Miss Margaret Wilson, Mrs. L. C. Parks, Mrs. Margaret Butler, Mrs. Alice Clement, Mrs. Emma F. Neukon, Mrs. T. D. Meder, and Gertrude Howe Britton. Bain News Service, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress  Three motorcycle officers with the LAPD are on duty in 1927\. From left to right: Miss Hildur Fleming; Miss Myra Richardson,; and Miss Beryl Wilson. Herald Examiner Collection, Los Angeles Public Library  Detective Mary Shanley of the NYPD pickpocket squad was well-known for her skill with a revolver. New York World-Telegram and the Sun Newspaper Photograph Collection, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress ## Transcript Touch the line throughout okay. And then you have to go back and then when you get to number two you've got to pick up your marker. And then jump over it. If there's a marker here you've got to jump over it. Get it. So [ BLANK_AUDIO ] and there's no walking either. [ BLANK_AUDIO ] okay. [ LAUGH ] [ APPLAUSE ] Then you go like this. [ NOISE ] Now I gotta jump over all that. Ready? Okay? If I touch the line or if I fall over [ INAUDIBLE ] [ SOUND ] Okay, so I slid out. Now it's your turn, you gotta go over one, and then over three, to five. [ BLANK_AUDIO ] Nice. Okay, okay, you're feet touch the line, but I'll let you go because it's your first time. I'll give it to you. [ UNKNOWN ] There you go. You missed your marker! Now go back. You've gotta pick your marker. There you go. 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