Dates

• Existence: 1941-

Biography

Barbara Jane Rinker Coffin, city hostess and policewoman, was born in Waterloo, Iowa, in 1941 to Ruth Davisson Rinker and J. Henry Rinker, who worked as a mechanical engineer at John Deere. Barbara Rinker married John Brucher when she was seventeen years old and had three sons with him. Barbara Brucher was hired as a city hostess in 1967 and held this job for seven years. As a city hostess, she wrote parking tickets, and assisted in transferring female witnesses and suspects to Des Moines. In April 1973 Barbara Brucher became the first female policewoman hired by the Waterloo Police Department. Brucher, then a single mother, wanted to become a policewoman because it meant doubling her salary from $3000 to $6000 per year. Barbara Brucher had a brief marriage in the early 1970s to Robert Rogers, before marrying fellow police officer Larry Coffin in 1979. Barbara Coffin worked in various positions during her twenty-three years with the Waterloo police department: dispatcher, patrol officer, liaison officer, and investigative officer. Barbara Coffin retired from the police force in February 1996

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