Jane Deeter Rippin

Jane Parker Deeter Rippin (1882–1953) was an American social worker, who served as the national director of the Girl Scouts of the USA from 1919 until 1930. During her tenure, she saw Girl Scout membership quintuple from 50,000 to 250,000; she also oversaw the formation of local Girl Scout councils and the start of Girl Scout cookie sales.[1]

Jane Deeter Rippin
Rippin (c)
National Director of the Girl Scouts of the USA
In office
1919–1930
PresidentJuliette Gordon Low
Personal details
Born
Jane Deeter

(1882-05-30) May 30, 1882
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
DiedJune 1953(1953-06-00) (aged 71)
Tarrytown, New York
SpouseJames Yardley Rippin
EducationB.S.
Alma materIrving College

Background

Rippin was born 30 May 1882 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to Jasper Newton Deeter and Sarah Emily Mather.[2] She married James Yardley Rippen in 1913 in Summerdale, Pennsylvania.[3]

Rippin trained as a teacher but decided to enter social work, finding a job at an orphanage. She went on to became a caseworker for the Philadelphia Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, and then a probation officer for the Municipal Court of Philadelphia.[4] In 1916, Rippin became the city’s chief probation officer, in charge of five courts, over the objections of a prominent judge who felt that “the position should be held by a man.”[5] She supervised 77 workers who made tens of thousands of “visits” a year, interviewing “warring couples,” abandoned children, indigent parents, and wayward young women.[6][7][8]

In 1917, she opened a "women offenders home" which included a treatment center, employment agency and court. [9]

In November 1917, she left Philadelphia to work for the Committee on Protective Work for Girls, a subcommittee of the Commission on Training Camp Activates (CTCA) and crucial branch of the American Plan. She believed that most women near military camps were "delinquent girls" that should be locked up[10] and proposed drafting women in some form of military service.[11]

In 1918 she restructured the CTCA Section on Women and Girls into ten national districts, each headed by a supervisor and "fixed post representatives'. Rippin instructed them that the fixed post representatives were to “concern [themselves] with delinquent girls and all girls between the ages of 10 and 21 against whom there has been any definite complaint,” The representatives would “also be responsible for work with the so-called charity girl and professional prostitute, whether diseased or not, and with women having venereal disease.”[12] Rippin further recommended the fixed post representatives appoint a “volunteer patrol” of local “business women” to go out in pairs and inconspicuously study local women, looking for suspicious ones.[13] At the fixed post worker’s instigation, those suspicious women were either given a talking to or arrested and examined.[14]

Under Rippin's command the Section on Women and Girls moved away from its goal of protecting reformable women to protecting the nation from women. In 1918 approximately 28,000 to 30,000 women and girls came under the supervision of Rippin's fixed post representatives and their supervisors.[15] [16][17][18]

She was a recipient of the Silver Fish Award, the highest adult award in Girlguiding, awarded for outstanding service to Girlguiding combined with service to world Guiding.[1]

References
  1. Liddell, Alix (1976). Story of the Girl Guides 1938-1975. London: Girl Guides Association.
  2. 1921 US Passport Application
  3. James Yardley Rippen and Jane Parker Deeter wedding in Pennsylvania, County Marriages, 1885-1950
  4. Allen, Anne Beiser (2000). An independent woman : the life of Lou Henry Hoover. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. p. 91. ISBN 1-56750-698-4. OCLC 49857459.
  5. "Woman Chief Probation Officer". The Jewish Exponent. December 22, 1916. p. 5.
  6. Johnson, Stanley (October 1916). "A Mender of Broken Hearts". The American Magazine. 94 (4): 52–53.
  7. "The Truth About the 'Love Triangle' At Last". San Diego Union. September 9, 1917. p. 25.
  8. "Reorganized Court to Preserve Family". Philadelphia Inquirer. December 19, 1916. p. 5.
  9. Thornton, Rachel (2016). "Jane Deeter Rippin". Gardner Digital Library. Cumberland County Historical Society. Retrieved 3 October 2023. in 1917, she opened a women offenders home for multipurpose municipal detention.6 It wasn't just a basic detention home, but it included an employment agency, court, diagnostic and treatment center, and the prison had dormitories in place of cells
  10. Rippin, Jane Deeter (January 1919). "Social Hygiene and the War: Work with Women and Girls". Social Hygiene. 5 (1): 127.
  11. Bristow, Nancy K. (1996). Making men moral : social engineering during the Great War. New York: New York University Press. p. 114. ISBN 0-585-08119-0. OCLC 44962867.
  12. Memorandum from Jane Deeter Rippin to Field Representatives, “Reorganization of Girls Protective Committee,” Bulletin No. 20, April 29, 1918, doc. 29349, Box 65, Entry 393, RG 165, NA.
  13. Jane Deeter Rippin, “Outline of Organization and Methods: Section on Women and Girls, Law Enforcement Division, War and Navy Department Commissions of Training Camp Activities,” pgs. 16-17, July 1, 1919, Folder 381, Box 24, A-127, ESDP.
  14. Letter from Prentice Sanger to O.B. Towne, April 23, 1918, doc. 31283, Box 71, Entry 393, RG 165, NA.
  15. Law Enforcement Division, pg. 69, Box 26, Entry 399, RG 165, NA;
  16. Law Enforcement Division, pg. 17, Box 2, Entry 404, RG 165, NA
  17. “Some Facts Bearing on the Campaign Against Venereal Disease in America,” n.d., Box 463, JDP.
  18. “Memorandum on the Interdepartmental Social Hygiene Board Submitted to the Appropriations Committee of the House on June 12, 1919,” Box 24, C14R.
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