New Britain herald., 1915-05-18
MRS. WELLS DESCRIBES
 POLlcEhEN'S WORK
J. 5. Leads in 1hs Department,
 Says Los Angeles Officer.

Baltimore, Md.,. May 1s.--A police- woman Mrs Alice Stebbins Wells, of Los Angeles Calif., was given close attention by special section of the National Conference of Charities and Correction here today when she told of policeWomen's work.
 N For a lon tgime past, she said, the sfKoman policeman has been a fig { ment of the imagination, held up to yidicule as the acme of the absurd and impossible, but though the last echo of derision still reverberates, thsne has grown a policewoman move nent as great ill strength and size as any recent humanitarian movement has attained in equal time"
 Cities With poIiccwomen. As the latest list of cities which have added regular policewomen as an integral part of the police department , for outside work, she named, Chica- kgoSAas leading with 20; Los Angeles, { Baltimore and Seattle with 5 each; San Francisco and St. Paul three n each; Topeka, Minneapolis, Dayton and Toronto, ? each; Vancouver. Far go. Grand Forks, Rochester, N. Y., cuse, Denver. Muncie, Colorado  Wayne. Ind, Racine Wis, and FhoepixY Ariz., one each. She also he&iGved that Sious City, Ia., Beatrice l and Omaha, Neh., Boston and Salem kAIass., Bellingham, Washington, and lthaca.s N. Y, were to be included in the list. and she named Poughkeepsie, IN. T., and Des Moines, Ia., as places Hwheres policewoman was paid from SpNvate funds, with approval of the y yohief. In addition there were numS1
 bus cities which employed
 iafrons..
 AEhe had found upon investigation | that the United States led in this de- | parture, for notwithstanding reports | Tot the employment of policewomen in 1 $fdreign countries she had been unable | | Ito learn. that they were officially em- ployed abroad except in Norway; and Yin England in, voluntary way. The need of women on the police 'force had arisen, she said, from the Fact that industrial and social energy no longer centered in the home, but has given us an age in which men, women and children, eat, sleep, work Rnd play together as never before in khe worlds history.
 Mrs. Wells First Policcwoman. M#AW TS.f fhSlIS Was IHe .llTSL pOilCe- i Fwo1 1>aan in Los Angeles, the post being k,reafeM upon her initiative. II had ehargeAof this york; she said, land . knoyl two things; That girls and Fornen mr r-troahle have right to the ympathetic help rof women officers Ind that men officers have a right to ! (xemption from what may be con- tant temptation to the weak, and I rom enforced and unnecessary asso- ; )iation with those who, if resentful, \GayeCast a cloud upon the reputation the most exemplary. The best of- cers are the most reluctant to under ake alone the handling of girls, and
 ill Sometimes resign in preference" 1
 Mrs. Wells told how the police Ioman's work took her into the home talk to mother and daughter as b man could hope to do, and of nu- perSns other police activities in { hich women engaged ,
 Work Not Silver Lining. ,
 T would not give the impression,
 e said, that the policewoman's prk is a silver. lining or an orna-
 ental fringe to the very dark clouds
 law enforcement for which police
 an stands in the average mind. She
 ansintegral part of the department
 "a stands for law enforcement, but
 largest and best work is to pre-
 nt, for the securing Of obedience to
 is the very best form of law en-
 Fcemerlt.
 "Does the policewoman make ar-
 H..11 IT