User:SoWhy/drafts/Jessie Duckstein

Jessie B. Duckstein (b. 1885/1886) was an American law enforcement agent and the first woman to be designated a "special agent" by the Bureau of Investigation (the precursor of the FBI), although Alaska P. Davidson is considered to be the first actual special agent.

Personal life
Not much is known about Duckstein's personal life before or after her career at the Bureau. According to contemporary coverage, she was married to Willian O. Duckstein but further details of the marriage are unknown.

Career
On 11 August 1921, then United States Attorney General Harry M. Daugherty appointed Duckstein as a temporary stenographer/typist for the Bureau of Investigation's Washington, D.C. office. By July 1923, she was confidential secretary to BOI director William Burns who on 20 November 1923 changed her official title to "special agent" at her request. A 37-year-old high school graduate, Duckstein was sent to New York City for training, after which she was assigned to the Washington, D. C. field office. Her experience at the headquarter was considered an asset when she went into the field. Her salary was $7 a day, plus $4 when traveling.

In March 1924, Burns was accused to have instructed Duckstein to leak information about the Teapot Dome scandal to her husband, then secretary to Edward Beale McLean, the publisher of The Washington Post.

After J. Edgar Hoover became acting director of the Bureau in 1924 following the Teapot Dome scandal, he asked for both Duckstein's and Davidson's resignation when the Special Agent in Charge at the Washington field office reported that he had "no particular work for a woman agent".

Only three women became agents in the 1920s and, with the resignation of Duckstein and Davidson in 1924 and Lenore Houston in 1928, the FBI had no female agents between 1929 and 1972.