Additional Text 2: WOMEN FIGHTING CRIME

by Michael Fooner

“We heard shots. The car radio came on and directed us to a building. Four men ran out, carrying shotguns. We jumped out of the car, guns drawn, and yelled, ‘Freeze! Police! Drop your guns!’ They stopped, and we got them up against the wall. We searched them, took them in, and booked them on charges of robbery and having weapons.”

Her partner was a man, and when asked about what happened, he said, “She did her part, the way it was supposed to be done.” Both officers got equal credit for “making a good collar.” That group of words is police jargon, meaning “carrying out a good arrest of suspects of a serious crime.”

Asked if her job is dangerous, Police Officer Parker – known as Alicia to her family and friends – says, “As a police officer, you’re trained. You know what to do.”

That kind of report could not have been made before 1900 because women were not allowed to be members of a police force until after that time. The first hiring of a woman as a regular police officer was in Stuttgart, Germany, in 1904. In the United States, the first female police officer was hired in Los Angeles in 1911. In London, Scotland Yard got its first regular woman police officer in 1915. In New York, women were hired to work in jails in the 1840’s and to work as police station turnkeys in the 1880’s, but these women were not looked upon as having regular police jobs. New York got its first regular policewomen in 1918. Because so many men were in the military service during World War I, (1914-1918), women were hired for police work. Since that time, a growing number of countries have hired women police officers.

While women and men police generally do the same things, women in some countries are given special duties. These duties often show the country’s way of life.

In India, female police officers often work on crowd control at festivals, demonstrations, and strikes when large numbers of woman take part. Another important job these police officers have is checking the belongings of female travelers to make sure that they are not taking illegal articles out of the country.

Control of auto traffic is the specialty of policewomen in Israel, where the traffic department is made up mostly of women. When women were first accepted for police work in Israel, they showed a special skill with traffic control and did so well that they became known as the best traffic officers in the world. They were asked to train traffic police in France, Great Britain, Japan, and many other countries. Because they did so well in traffic control, they were able to ask for other jobs in different branches of the department. Today, there are more women on the Israeli police force than in any other force in the world.

England was one of the first countries to give women patrol duty – an area that once belonged only to men. The Beat Constable Team was formed in England and is now used in other countries as well. It is a patrol system by teams of uniformed officers, with at least one female member on each team. When on patrol, the police officers get to know the people in the neighborhood. They listen to what the people have to say and watch for possible trouble. Besides working in the neighborhoods, the teams patrol airports, markets, and highways.

In many countries – such as France, England, Scotland, Germany, and the United States – women play an important part in detective work. They gather information from all sorts of places and study it, help find criminals and victims, and find stolen goods. Usually they work in plain clothes. They go to the scene of a crime to get the facts. They question the people who saw the crime to get leads from them. But not all detectives work in plain clothes. Some work undercover, dressing and pretending to be criminals or possible victims. A New York City police officer named Kathleen has played the part of a housewife, Swedish nurse, and youth-gang member at different times to arrest drug pushers, purse snatchers, and robbers. Another officer, “Muggable Mary,” made three hundred arrests in two years on the city streets.

Using women in detective work is an old idea that started before police departments were willing to accept them as regular officers. As early as 1893, Chicago had at least one woman assigned to help male detectives on difficult cases in which women and children were involved.

At one time, it might have seemed strange to see women on the police force. But today, the public in many parts of the world has become used to seeing women patrolling the city streets, directing traffic, doing detective work, and making arrests.

Questions:

1. What are some of the kinds of police work that women do in different parts of the world?

2. When were women first allowed to work as regular police officer?

3. What do you think is the reason that women were kept out of police work for so many years?

4. Are they given any special duties?

5. What do you think is the reason that women are especially successful in plain-clothes detective work?

6. What qualities are necessary to became a successful female police officer?

Additional Text 3: ALL-AROUND CHAMPION

The Life of Jim Thorpe (1888 – 1953)

James Francis Thorpe and his twin brother, Charles, were born in 1888 on an Indian reservation. The area later became part of the state of Oklahoma. Jim’s father was half Indian and half Irish. He could run, jump, and swim better than anyone else on the reservation. Jim’s mother was the granddaughter of the famous Indian chief, Black Hawk. The Thorpes also had two older sons and two younger daughters.

Young Jim and Charlie loved the out-of-doors. The twins spent hours racing each other across their parents’ 160-acre farmland. By the time the boys were four, they could ride and swim. But then, at the age of nine, Charlie died.

In 1904, when Jim was sixteen, he went to the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania. It was an industrial school for Indians run by the federal government. Jim chose tailoring as the trade he wanted to learn.

One day Jim was watching the athletic coach, Glenn “Pop” Warner, work with the track team. Again and again, each boy tried to clear the high jump bar, set at five feet nine inches. Each boy made the short run, jumped into the air, kicked with his legs – and knocked the crossbar to the ground. “No, no!” the coach would yell. “You’ve got to roll over the bar.”

Jim had never tried the high jump before, but he thought it looked easy. Finally the path to the bar was empty. Jim got up and started running. He jumped at just the right moment, clearing the bar with inches to spare. It was the first time anyone had done so all afternoon.

Pop Warner was impressed with Jim’s jump that day. The following year, he put Jim on the varsity football team. During most of the season, however, Jim sat on the bench. But one day when the regular halfback was injured, Jim got his big chance. The small Carlisle school was playing the mighty University of Pennsylvania. In Jim’s first try, he charged sixty-five yards for one touchdown and then eighty-five yards for a second! Before the football season was over, Jim Thorpe was the most talked-about player in Pennsylvania.

During the 1911 football season, Jim was the star of the team. In a game against unbeaten Harvard, he scored all of Carlisle’s points, as they won 18-15. In Carlisle’s game against Army, Jim ran ninety-seven yards for a touchdown and made twenty-two points. Carlisle beat Army, 27-6. Jim’s record the next season was just as impressive, and, as a result, he was named to the All-American team both years. Pop Warner called his star athlete “the greatest football player of all time.”

During the summer of 1909, Jim went with some of the other students to North Carolina. There they did some farm work and played baseball. Jim made fifteen dollars a week playing baseball – because he “liked to play ball.” But years later, he would regret every penny he earned playing baseball that summer.

When Jim returned to Carlisle, Pop Warner told him that he had the potential for being an Olympic champion. Under Warner’s coaching, Jim began to train.

The 1912 Olympics were held in Stockholm, Sweden. Jim entered the pentathlon and the decathlon. He won both!

The pentathlon is a five-event contest. It includes the running broad jump, javelin throw, 200-meter dash, discus throw, and the 1500-meter race. Jim came in first in four of the five events.

The decathlon is a ten-event contest. It covers all forms of track and field. The winner is considered the best all-around athlete in the world. Out of possible 10,000 points, Jim scored 8,412. No one else came close to his amazing score!

For his accomplishments at the Olympics, Jim received many trophies and medals. Among them was a sliver chalice presented to him by the King of Sweden.

Back in the United States, Jim was a hero. He was honored all over the country for his performance at the Olympics.

When Jim finished school at Carlisle in 1913, he became a baseball player for the New York Giants. But then his troubles began. Jim received a letter asking him to appear before the American Athletic Union to answer charges brought against him.

During the course of the inquiry, it was brought out that Jim had accepted money for playing ball. That made him a professional athlete, and professionals were not allowed to compete in the Olympics. As a result, Jim had to return all his Olympic awards, and his name was removed from all the records. It was as though he had never even been to the Olympics.

Pop Warner and Jim tried to appeal the decision of the A.A.U. But they were turned down.

Jim played professional baseball until 1919. In 1920, he helped start what later became the National Football League. In 1925, at the age of thirty-seven, he was the star of the New York Giants football team.

Jim retired from professional sports in 1929. The next several years were hard ones. He tried many things – lecturing on sports and on Indian culture; helping the Sac and Fox Indians back in Oklahoma; and doing bit parts in Hollywood westerns. In 1932, he was working as a laborer in Los Angeles, California.

The 1932 Olympics were to be held in Los Angeles. But Jim could not even afford a ticket. Somehow, people found out about Jim. Hundreds offered him their tickets. The Vice-President of the United States, Charles Curtis, himself part Indian, also heard about Jim’s plight. He invited Jim to join him in the presidential box. At the opening ceremony, one hundred thousand fans gave Jim Thorpe a standing ovation. He had not been forgotten.

Jim Thorpe was remembered again in 1950. The 393 sportswriters and broadcasters of the Associated Press were asked their opinions on two questions: Who did they think was the greatest football player, and who did they think was the greatest male athlete of the first half of the 1900’s? When the results of the polls were announced, Jim had won them both. No one could ever beat the mighty Jim Thrope!

Questions:

1. Where did Jim Thorpe first complete as an athlete?

2. How did Jim first win recognition for his athletic ability?

3. What was Jim’s most outstanding accomplishment at the 1912 Olympics?

4. Why was Jim later forced to give up his Olympic awards?

5. What did Jim do after he retired from professional sports?

6. What was the last honor awarded Jim Thorpe in his lifetime?