Keystone Today

It has been 50 years since the first woman state trooper broke the all-male barrier for the Pennsylvania State Police and on July 7 those first women were honored at a ceremony at the academy in Hershey.

According to a press release, on July 7, 1972 there were 14 women who graduated from the Pennsylvania State Police Academy in the 31st Cadet Class, which was the first to admit a female cadets. Surviving members of the class were invited to commemorate the occasion.

“These women were motivated to enlist by a sense of duty and a genuine interest in police work," said Colonel Robert Evanchick, Commissioner of the Pennsylvania State Police. "We owe them a debt of gratitude for their roles in breaking barriers and blazing trails that have helped make this Department what it is today.” 

The Pennsylvania State Police was the first state police agency in the country to fully integrate female troopers into regular command. Before this, the jobs in the agency were exclusively for men.

The first woman in the department to head a bureau was Kathryn (Hosmer) Doutt in 1995. She was promoted to major and assigned to the position of director of the Bureau of Patrol. In 2000, she became the first female troop commander for PSP when she was assigned to run Troop K in Philadelphia.

In 1989, Lucinda Hammond (Hawkins) was the first female state trooper to receive the Pennsylvania State Police Commendation Medal. This was from when she and another trooper pulled a trapped occupant out of a tractor-trailer that crashed and was in flames. They safely pulled the occupant out just before it exploded.

Others in the 31st Cadet Class include Regina Adams, Jill Bairhalter, Romaine Engle, Judith Galloway, Nancy Lightner, Judith McCarr, Ann Metcalf, Patricia Moe, Kathryn Neville, Mary Connie Rossetti, Doris Sott and Barbara Wharrey.