Ruthine Pascal-Maynard: A Pioneer in Uniform, a Life Built on Discipline and Service

When Ruthine Pascal-Maynard walked from Grand Fond to Roseau in 1961 to apply to become a police officer, she was 21 years old.

There was no grand plan to make history. She had heard that the police were recruiting, saw an opportunity and went after it.

“I walked from Grand Fond to Roseau and went for an application,” she recalled. “We sat an exam and I passed. So that is how I got enlisted in the force.”

She passed on her first attempt.

More than six decades later, Pascal-Maynard revisited those formative years during a special edition of This Week in Interview on TDN Radio Caribbean, hosted by Anthony Drigo.

Now in her mid-80s and living in Sint Maarten, Pascal-Maynard was assisted during the conversation by her youngest daughter, who helped relay some of Drigo’s questions to her. But the memories, stories and lessons belonged unmistakably to Pascal-Maynard.

For Drigo, the opportunity to speak with one the early women of the Dominica Police Force was about more than nostalgia.

“I get to meet so many special people,” he told his audience as he introduced his guest, describing Pascal-Maynard as a Dominican treasure.

From Grand Fond to the Police Force

Born in 1940, Pascal-Maynard was the child of Marcel Pascal and Catherine Cuffy. She attended the Grand Fond Government School, completing Standard Seven at 15 before becoming a pupil teacher for four years.

Teaching was among the relatively limited career options open to young Dominican women of her generation. Nursing was another. Women could also become domestic workers, work in agriculture or, as many did during that period, migrate to the United Kingdom in search of greater opportunity.

Pascal-Maynard chose policing.

“When you are looking for work and the first opportunity you get, I embraced it,” she told Drigo.

Her family was proud that one of their own had secured a government position. There was concern, naturally, about the risks involved in police work, but that did not deter her.

“Every parent is concerned about the welfare of their children,” she said. “There was a concern, but something had to happen. So, as you say, you take your chance.”

She enlisted in October 1961 and the following month travelled to Barbados for six months of police training.

Two other Dominican women, Miss Unadi James from Marigot and Miss Eugene Leconinte from Colihaut, were part of her group.

During the interview Pascal-Maynard also made an important clarification about her place in the history of women in the force. Her group was not the very first cohort of Dominican women sent for training. Three women, whom she remembered as Myrtle Williams, Mary Joseph and another officer whose first name she couldn’t remember, had gone before them.

Six Months of Rigorous Training

Barbados was also Pascal-Maynard’s first trip outside of Dominica.

She travelled aboard one of the federal ships that connected the Caribbean islands at the time, a detail that prompted Drigo to reflect on an era when inter-island sea transportation allowed Caribbean people to move relatively easily the region.

Once Pascal-Maynard arrived in Barbados, there was little time for sightseeing.

Training was intensive.

“First thing in the morning we had to go running,” she recalled.

Physical training was followed by drill, breakfast and classes. The recruits studied law, national defense, self-defense, detective work and security. They marched, learned rifle shooting and were required to become certified in first aid through the St. John Brigade, which was an equivalent to the Red Cross.

An Indian army drill instructor, whom Pascal-Maynard remembered as Mr. Brock, was responsible for some of their training.

What she does not remember is feeling that being a woman meant she had to outperform the men to earn her place.

“We didn’t have those feelings at that time,” she said. “We didn’t feel we had to outperform the men.”

Her answer intrigued Drigo. Looking at it through a modern lens, he repeatedly tried to determine whether the pioneering women had encountered resistance from their male colleagues or from a public unaccustomed to seeing women exercise police authority.

Pascal-Maynard simply did not frame her experience that way.

By the time her group returned from Barbados, the public had already begun seeing the first group of women in uniform. She also remembered her male colleagues as supportive.

Perhaps, Drigo joked, nobody dared test her because she was simply too serious.

Pascal-Maynard laughed, but her response revealed something about her philosophy of policing.

“Being a police officer, you have to be serious,” she said. “Even dealing with people, you have to be serious. Although, let us say, you have to be kind. And you also have be be caring.”

Authority, in other words, did not have to come at the expense of humanity.

Women, Children and Domestic Violence

There were, however, duties for which the presence of women officers became particularly important. Pascal-Maynard recalled that women police officers were called upon in matters involving women and children.

“That’s why they had to put women in the force, to deal with certain things concerning the women and children,” she said.

Drigo raised the subject of domestic violence, noting the old Dominican attitude embodied in the saying that “home trouble is not for police.”

Pascal-Maynard’s recollection was different when it came to the official response.

Police, she said, condemned domestic violence and were expected to intervene when incidents were reported.

“We always condemn domestic violence in whatever form it shows up its head,” she said. “Whenever there is a reported case, we have to intervene to put back peace.”

She recalled relatively few officially reported domestic-violence cases during her time in the force. But when reports were made, she said, police were expected to take them seriously.

From Traffic to the Magistrate’s Court

Pascal-Maynard’s early mentors included Inspectors Doctrove and Philbert of La Plaine, respectively.

Her most difficult encounters, were not with hardened criminals. They were with drivers after accidents.

“When an accident happens, each person feels they are right,” she explained. “Nobody is deciding to take the wrong for the accident. So you get a lot of arguments from those guys.”

The police officer arriving at the scene therefore had two jobs; investigate what happened and lower the temperature between the parties.

“You have to make peace between the two people,” she said.

Traffic duty became one of several assignments she remembers clearly. She investigated accidents and directed traffic at the junction of Queen Mary Street and King George V Street, especially when school was dismissed and children needed to cross safely. She also served as an administrative clerk in the office of the Chief of Police and performed security duties during visits by British royalty and government officials from other Caribbean territories.

Regional sporting events brought other assignments. Whether Dominica was hosting cricket, football, netball or another tournament, officers were needed for security.

And then there were the parades.

“Oh yes,” she replied enthusiastically when asked whether she looked forward to marching in them.

But one assignment appears to have held a special place in her memory; assisting the prosecutor at the Magistrate’s Court. She was responsible preparing documents, exhibits and other material required for cases.

“I liked working with the prosecutor,” she said.

It was meticulous work, exactly the sort of work that suited a woman whose life would continue to be marked by organization and discipline long after she took off the uniform.

Leaving the Force at 26

Pascal-Maynard’s police career lasted approximately five years, by choice. At 26, after she got married, she resigned.

A number of the other pioneering women also eventually left the Dominica, she remembers some migrating to Canada and the United States.

Pascal-Maynard moved to St. Maarten with her husband and entered a very different chapter of her life. Police work was behind her, but work itself certainly was not. Her husband owned and operated a mall agency business, and Pascal-Maynard joined him. The company dealt in shipping, insurance and the sale of various products, including hardware, like plywood. She became an integral part of the enterprise.

“People say that I was a Godsend for him,” she told Drigo.

The business endured and is still operating 65 years later. Her police career may have been relatively brief, but the habits cultivated through education, police training and public service followed her into marriage, motherhood and business. That became evident when Drigo turned to Pascal-Maynard’s youngest daughter near the end of the interview.

Was her mother, he wondered, a “militant mother”? Could the family see remnants of the police officer at home?

“Definitely,” her daughter replied. “Everything was by order, in a certain pattern.”

The household ran according to schedules. The children knew what was happening the next day and even what they would be eating.

“Everything was just scheduled,” her daughter said.

“Organized,” Drigo concluded.

“Very much,” she replied.

“Focus on What You Want to Do”

As the programme came to an end, Drigo asked Pascal-Maynard what she would tell a young person of 20 or 21, roughly the age she was when she applied to join the Dominica Police Force.

“Whatever they want to do,” she began. “They want to pursue in life, they must focus on what they want to do and work hard to achieve, to be successful in what they want to do.”

She mentioned a few qualities she believes should accompany that focus.

“They must be very punctual and they must be persistent and they must be very honest too in their dealings with people.” It was a concise summary of the values that emerge repeatedly from her own story; discipline, persistence, punctuality, service and honesty.

As the interview drew to a close, messages from relatives, viewers and listeners began appearing, congratulating her and expressing pride in her contribution.

Pascal-Maynard, in turn, thanked Drigo for giving her the opportunity to share part of her experience.

For the host, the conversation demonstrated why the stories of Caribbean elders need to be recorded while the can still tell them in their voices.

“We really have to honour our elders,” Drigo reflected after his guest had left the screen. “They have so much knowledge.”

Ruthine Pascal-Maynard’s story is not simply that of a woman who wore a police uniform when women in uniform were still a novelty in Dominica. It is a story of a 21-year-old from the village of Grand Fond who heard that an opportunity existed, walked to the capital city, Roseau, to pursue it, passed the exam, travelled outside her country for the first time to undergo rigorous training, and returned prepared to serve. Later exchanging police working for marriage, family and business, but apparently never surrendered the discipline that had characterized her youth.

More than 60 years later, her advice to another generation sounds remarkably similar to the way she lived her own life; focus. Work hard, be punctual, be persistent, and above all, be honest.