Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 214, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 September 1912 — WOMAN AS A GUARD [ARTICLE]

WOMAN AS A GUARD

First “Night Watchwoman” of Metropolis Has Post In Vicinity of Washington Square—Not Afraid of v Thieves. New York.—“ Then," said a reporter for a New York pdper to a woman in white, accompanied by a little girl, as she placed a couple of red lanterns in position outside 12 Macdougal alley, “you are the only woman night watchman in the city?” ■ “You mean,” replied Mrs. Astrid Wolfe, “that I am the only night watchwoman in the city.” When the reporter remembered that Mrs. Wolfe and her nine-year-old daughter Lillian carried the banner for the mothers’ division in the woman suffrage parade last spring he accepted the correction. Mrs. Wolfe wore around her neck a black ribbon, which bore, instead of a watch, a police whistle. In her strong hand was her nightstick. Every policeman around Washington square is alert for any alarm from Mrs. Wolfe’s post, which is a big, dark, echoing building, yawning upon Eighth street. It is the sort a place that would scare the average woman after dark. The building is unoccupied, save by her, as it is being remodeled. “You see/’ explained Mrs. Wolfe, after she had put Lillian to bed in the echoing house, "thieves don’t care about the timber; it’s the plumbing fixtures they would come for. After putting the lights in position I sit and read all night, except at intervals phen I make a thorough search of the building. I usually feel lucky if I get to bed after breakfast. Then I get a little sleep, if the workmen don’t make too much noise. “WJiy have I a Job so strange for a woman? A year ago, after a serious illness, I found it necessary to, get work at once. I had myself and Lillian to support. I had no friends. I was told there was a job watching at in an apartment house that was being built on St. Nicholas avenue. So 1 went to the agent and applied. I told him I was afraid of nothing. I got the job. Before that I had been a probation officer for the Florence Crittenden home on Bleeker street. It tras there that I saw my first fight. , “One evening I saw a man leaning against the door of a house across the way. Every now and then he knocked a pane of glass out of the door with his elbow while he pretended to lean against It. I went over and asked what he was doing. He struck me a blow on my right shoulder that almost paralyzed me. He rmOend I fainted from the pain. An soon as I recovered I ran, calling for the police. “When I found a policeman and led him back, there was the thief back on the job. He thought he had scared me. : I made a rush at Jiim. I wanted to let him know that I could give a punch. But the cop got him instead. “Ever since then I have carried a police whistle and nightstick when on The erther day I made some bums get off the steps. They were waiting tiU it was dark to steal into the house. When I tol<Lthem to move on they defied me. I Just blew qiy

whistle and sailed Into them with my stick. You should have seen them beat It”