The Interesting Story of Deadshot Mary

 Mary Shanley was born in Ireland in 1896, and after immigrating to the US with her family, she made the bold choice to join the NYPD.

Along with some other female policemen, she went to work on Undercover Beats.

In their first year on the force, they were assigned fortune-tellers and psychics, professions that were illegal at the time, as they were believed to hunt vulnerable women (and were mostly practiced by immigrants).

She is later given an anti-pocket beat, cruising around department stores dressed as a typical shopper, sometimes with her niece as a seduction.

In 1934, the NYPD began requiring its female officers to carry revolvers. A few years later, Shenley made history when she became the first woman in the NYPD to use her gun in the line of duty, firing a warning shot in the air to stop a suspect who was fleeing 53rd Street. (The warning shot would become a signature for him throughout his career.)

She became a minor local celebrity, appearing in crime blotters and tabloids every time she called a suspect, eventually being nicknamed "Deadshot Mary".

Shenley became one of the first women to reach the rank of Detective First Grade in the NYPD. His career was nearly derailed in 1941, when he was suspended for firing his service weapon while drinking off-duty at a Jackson Heights bar, but he was soon reinstated, and his retirement in 1957 continued to bust petty thieves.

"It's exciting. If I had to go back to work in the office I'd be dead." ~ Mary Shanley, 1937