Southeast Ohio’s Vinton County recently unveiled a new mural honoring the state’s first female sheriff: the prisoner-wrangling, homicide-solving single mother of five — Maude Collins.
Collins was appointed as Vinton County’s sheriff in 1925, after her husband was killed in the line of duty.
“Of course she was very knowledgeable of what a sheriff did, so it did not take very long before Maude took over as sheriff,” said Deanna Tribe, president of the Vinton County Historical Society.
Collins served the rest of her husband’s term, and then defeated contenders in the next primary and general elections to keep the job.
Making a name for herself
Once in office, Collins made her own name.
“Of course those were moonshining days, so she has a record of breaking up some stills,” Tribe said.
She became the first woman to deliver prisoners to the state penitentiary, and she famously solved a double homicide by studying the footprints left behind.
“The person that had done the murder had actually worn somebody else's shoes,” Tribe said.
Collins deduced someone big enough to wear the shoes would have left deeper footprints, and she correctly identified the killer.
“People still talk about it to some extent because that was a very important case and Maude actually solved it,” Tribe said.
After finishing her term as sheriff, Collins went on to serve as a clerk of courts and later as a matron at the Columbus State School. She died in 1972 when she was 78.
Vinton County’s mural
To commemorate 100 years since Collins became the state’s first female sheriff, the Vinton County Department of Tourism and artist Pamela Kellough unveiled a mural of her in October on the side of the county’s courthouse.
The project was funded by the Ohio Arts Council.
Tribe says the mural is an eye-catching way to honor Collins' contributions and she hopes young people find inspiration in the sheriff’s story.
“That's pretty exciting to know that the first female sheriff actually occurred in this rural county and it was in the first decade when women had the right to vote,” she said.
