From Social Worker to Crimefighter: Women in United States Municipal Policing

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Description

In the United States, women in policing evolved from matrons to policewomen to police officers. Today, the position of police chief has been achieved by women. The changing role of women in this traditionally male-dominated field is the subject of this book. It weaves together the history of the police and the history of women and highlights a century of change in law enforcement. The book also describes how the changing role of women in society affected their role in law enforcement.

Reviews

"Dorothy Schulz has produced a work which is not only academically sound, but is also highly readable. She begins with the, surprisingly early, enrollment of police matrons and social workers dealing solely with women and children and concludes with the acceptance of women as crimefighters on the same standing as their male colleagues. Throughout, the author properly and tellingly interweaves pertinent points from the story of the fluctuating fortunes of feminism. I have no doubt that this much needed and important book will remain the authoritative work on the subject for many years to come."-Joan Lock, police historian author of The British Policewoman: Her Story
"Now, finally, a first-rate history on the 20th century emergence of women police has been produced. This is 'must' reading for any student of social control."- Barbara Raffel Price, Ph.D. Dean of Graduate Studies John Jay College of Criminal Justice
"Simply put, this is the best book on the early history of women in policing available today. The author knows her subject, and this historical account helps to set the record straight on the many contributions of women in the law enforcement field. It will be of interest to men as well as women, and to the general public as well as the criminal justice profession."- Richard H. Ward, Professor of Criminal Justice and Associate Chancellor, University of Illinois, Chicago
"Provides a distinctly balanced, eminently readable chronicle of the men and women who laid the foundation for women police officers today....[This book] should be required reading for every student of police history, every new academy student, and each and every correction and police administrator in the country....We can be grateful that Dorothy Moses Schulz has created what is sure to become the standard text on women and policing, and look forward to what this important new work engenders."-Law Enforcement News
Provides a distinctly balanced, eminently readable chronicle of the men and women who laid the foundation for women police officers today....[This book] should be required reading for every student of police history, every new academy student, and each and every correction and police administrator in the country....We can be grateful that Dorothy Moses Schulz has created what is sure to become the standard text on women and policing, and look forward to what this important new work engenders.-Law Enforcement News
Schulz offers a solid social history of the roles women filled in policing American communities from the 1820s through the 1980s. Not intended to be a theoretical or analytical treatment of either gender or law enforcement, it offers interesting narrative and presents with appropriate praise many actual women who faced high risks and high challenge as they sought first to improve policing and then to gain equal footing on patrol.-Choice
This much-needed book will doubtless remain the authoritative work on the subject for some time and is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the development of women police or, indeed, the history of social control in the United States.-Police History Society Journal
"Schulz offers a solid social history of the roles women filled in policing American communities from the 1820s through the 1980s. Not intended to be a theoretical or analytical treatment of either gender or law enforcement, it offers interesting narrative and presents with appropriate praise many actual women who faced high risks and high challenge as they sought first to improve policing and then to gain equal footing on patrol."-Choice
"This much-needed book will doubtless remain the authoritative work on the subject for some time and is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the development of women police or, indeed, the history of social control in the United States."-Police History Society Journal

Author Bio

DOROTHY MOSES SCHULZ is Professor of Law, Police Studies, and Criminal Justice Administration at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice (City University of New York). She was the first woman captain to serve with the Metro-North Commuter Railroad Police Department and its predecessor department, the Conrail Police Department. She is the author of From Social Worker to Crimefighter: Women in United States Municipal Policing (Praeger, 1995), and has published widely on historical and current issues involving women in policing. She is a member of numerous police and academic associations, and has spoken at conferences of the International Association of Women Police, Women in Federal Law Enforcement, the National Center for Women & Policing, the Senior Women Officers of Great Britain, and the Canadian Police College.