The Daily News-Journal from Murfreesboro, Tennessee • 25

women's inferesi feafures today people Sunday, April 1,1979 The women of the Tennessee Highway Patrol A Mv ivV 'yN ST -na -u-ffr I i 3', rff cr--? Diane Smith takes an application for a driver's license. Betsy Sturgeon administers the eye test. It not boring job Sometimes the troopers tease them, like asking them if they sell girl scout cookies. But it's all in fun and makes for a "brother-sister" camaraderie at the station, Ms. Smith said.

Besides, it's nice to have them around if you need them, the women agreed. Iff- I 7 v. By Terri Kamiriski News Journal Staff Writer Don't try to tell Diane and Betsy that women don't drive as well as men. They won't agree. The shoulders aren't as broad as one might expect behind silver badges on khaki uniform shirts, but women run the show at the area license examining station in the State Highway Patrol Office.

And Diane Smith and Betsy Sturgeon agree that just as many men as women fail their written and road tests. Taking a road test can be a harrowing experience for a neophyte driver, but the women say it can be just as frightening to share the front seat. Like the time an elderly woman didn't quite have a grip on the mechanics of her car. She tried to zip out of the parking lot in reverse. Forgetting to put the car iniorward gear Panicking, she hit the gas several times before finding the brake pedal.

Mrs. Sturgeon still smiles recalling the event. By some miracle, she said, nothing was damaged, but perhaps the woman's pride. Before the parking lot was paved behind the testing station on Old Fort Parkway, old telephone poles were used to mark off parking, Ms. Smith said.

And they became the "surmountable dilemma" for more.than one new driver behind the wheel. "They'd forget to reverse, driving their cars up over the poles and they'd just hang there," MsrSmith recalled. The incident is laughable in retrospect, but it invariably resulted in a quick and decisive end to the road test and initiated a phone call to a local towing service. The two women agreed that the road test given is not a tough one it involves no parallel parking, no expressway driving just four turns and two stop signs, for the most part. And most people pass it on their first try, they said.

A Running one of the stop signs if a more common, and most grievous road test error, Ms. Smith The idea is to maintain composure as a driver bears down on a stop sign at 30 miles per hour, and then let loose with a loud "STOP!" If the red sign wp four letters doesn't evoke the proper response. It's then time to sign the driver up for the road test on another day. "You might tell a driver, 'that was a stop but you never tell him that he's failed while he's behind the wheel," Ms. Smith said.

"You get yourself back safe, first." Sturgeon said the examiner must sometimes take the helm and drive the applicant back to the station if the test goes especially bad. But thankfully, itrarelvhaDDens. she "was bored to death with a desk job." Ms. Smith said she opted for her career because it was one of the top-paying positions for women in the state department. Boredom is something the women say they don't have to worry about.

After processing their 113th customer in one day, Ms. Smith fell into a chair, lit a cigarette and smiled like she had just won a marathon. "Today I even got -to eat half of my sandwich for lunch," she explained. Thanks to the appearance 6f three state troopers who relieved them from their road test duties, they spent the day manning the office. Applicants were shuttled from the eye test machine to the long table where they sat pencil in hand, frowning over the written Facial expressions unfurled on the applicants' faces as they listened to the pronouncements of the women, each a separate drama.

It, didn't take a psychologist to determine who passed and who failed. "When you first start working here, you're a softy," Ms. Smith said. "You feel so bad about failing -r people." Tear-stained faces traveled a hot line to their hearts at one time, and it was difficult to feel like an ogre. "But the longer you're here, the less bad you feel.

"Ms. Smith said. Toughening up is a basic step in the evolution of the license examiner, they agreed. Mrs. Sturgeon offered a practical explanation for being fair without being lenient with license applicants "You just have to remember that you might be the one to meet them on the road." Rude applicants irk the women.

And though their relatively diminutive size bars them from physically throwing a customer out the front door, they admit sometimes they get angry enough to wish for Herculean strength. A "The majority of the people who come in here are nice," Ms. Smith explained. "But no matter where you go you're going to get some bad apples." Bad apples are persons who cuss. And persons who get testy when they fail part of their driving test.

And sometimes the bad apples are even drunks who wander in for a road test. "Some of these people say the last time they've had a drink was last night, but if that's true, they must have slept in their clothes," Mrs. Sturgeon said Last summer a man barged into their office from the waiting room demanding to know why the waiting area wasn't air conditioned. He as a skunk" and real nasty," Ms. Smith recalled.

A state trooper beard the commotion from across the hall and arrested the fellow, she said. The women said they appreciate their auarters in -thesame tnnldlnwlth flie state.Mghway troopers. Murfreesboro isrone of their favorite stops on their alternating work schedules, which include several weeks of work in Nashville followed by time spent at a number of county testing postst fWilBI The driving test isn't hard, but It Is a must for a license. A Uf) If. 1 if 1 i "The longer you work here, they don scare you aa JadIs5miuYiaidorthe driverSr-A-license -examiner for more than seven years, she said few things surprise her any more.

Mrs. Sturgeon is newer to the job, signing on with the state department in 1977 as an examiner becayse You passed and you failed! Photos by Stephen D. Workman.