On 23 May 1974 Commissioner M. J. Nadon announced that the RCMP would take applications from women for regular police duties. Thirty-two of them were sworn in on 16 September as Troop 17, started training at Depot Division in Regina two days later, and graduated on 3 March 1975. What they were issued when they got there is the part usually left out. Not this uniform. The first women in the force were given black pumps, a pillbox cap, a fitted blouse and a skirt, and instead of a duty belt they carried a clutch purse — fitted internally with a holster for the firearm, ammunition and a set of handcuffs. The RCMP's own history describes the outfit as pulled straight out of the 1940s. Women did not receive the standard uniform of the force — red serge, Stetson, high browns and breeches — until the early 1990s, roughly eighteen years after the first troop graduated. So the figure here is not wearing what those thirty-two wore. She is wearing what took another generation of them to be given, and the handbag with a gun holster sewn inside it is the entire argument in a single object.

The sculpt has her in the full red serge with the Stetson, breeches, high brown riding boots and duty equipment — the same turnout as the male figures in this set, which is the historically interesting thing about it rather than an incidental. Bev Busson became the force's first female commissioner in December 2006. The other two figures in the set are the RCMP trooper on foot and the mounted trooper of the Musical Ride, and the three stand together properly. For the same pattern in another service — women doing the work first and being given the recognition long afterwards — see the USAAF WASP service pilot, who ferried combat aircraft in wartime and waited decades to be counted as a veteran.

Model: 10102 / W. Britain / 1/30 scale / matte finish / 1 piece set