The Girls Who Fought Crime
The Untold True Story of the Country's First Female Investigator and Her Crime Fighting Squad
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
For fans of Margot Lee Shetterley and Liza Mundy comes an inspiring feminist tale of a woman who dedicated her entire life to the New York Police Department, upending the patriarchy and the status quo for women working in public service.
Corsets, Crime, and the Woman to Change Modern Policing Forever
Mary “Mae” Foley was a force to be reckoned with. On one hip she held her makeup compact, on the other, her NYPD badge. When women were fighting for the vote, Mae was fighting crime in the heart of New York City – taking down rapists, boot-leggers, Nazis, and serial killers. One of the first women to be sworn into the police force, Mae not only fought crime in the city that never sleeps, but also did something much bigger – challenged the patriarchal systems that continually tried to shut her and other women down. The result of her efforts? A long career that helped over 2,000 women join her auxiliary police force, the ‘Masher Squad.’ Mae Foley is proof that women can do anything men can do, all while wearing corsets and the perfect shade of rouge.
From renowned author, speaker, and retired U.S. Army Major General Mari K. Eder comes the exciting and superbly researched story of a trailblazer who courageously dedicated her life to public service.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Retired Army major general Eder (The Girls Who Stepped Out of Line) profiles in this colorful account the "tough, intrepid" Mae Foley (1886-1952), who became one of New York City's first policewomen in 1923. Originally assigned to the so-called "masher squad," which policed crimes committed by men against women (from pocket-picking to murder), in 1925 Foley was promoted to detective and attached to Manhattan's 19th Precinct. In 1930 she transferred to the 108th Precinct in Queens, where she investigated the 3X Murders, a still unsolved series of shootings by a killer who signed eerie letters to the press as "3X." (On one occasion, Foley acted as bait for the killer, but caught a garden-variety mugger instead.) At various points in her career, she raided bootleggers' stills as part of the squad that enforced the Volstead Act during Prohibition; fought Nazis on Long Island; and kept safe the sex-worker witnesses testifying against gangster Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Eder also describes how Foley stood up for herself and her sister officers against the patriarchy of the police force, where women were held to higher standards than men. Eder's vivid and raucous narrative brings to life the cops-and-robbers jousting of Prohibition-era New York. Aficionados of the city's underground history should take a look.
