ROCKLAND (AP) – A high school dropout who rose through the ranks to become a Knox County detective says she was stunned by her election victory that makes her Maine’s first female sheriff.

“It still hasn’t sunk in yet,” Donna Dennison, a grandmother, said a day after her election in Knox County. State police and the Maine Sheriff’s Association say her election Tuesday makes her the first woman in Maine to head a sheriff’s department.

Dennison, 54, defeated Chief Sheriff’s Deputy Todd Butler and retired Rockland Police Chief Alfred Ockenfels in a close finish, taking about 35 percent of the vote. A big win in her hometown of St. George helped to put Dennison over the top.

Dennison will replace Sheriff Daniel Davey, who lost in a primary in June.

Butler, her current supervisor in the sheriff’s department, congratulated Dennison and wished her luck in her new post. Ockenfels said Dennison will make a fine sheriff, adding, “I think it’s great for the state of Maine” to have its first female sheriff.

It’s been a long and steady climb to the post for Dennison, who dropped out of high school when she was 16 but later earned her equivalency degree.

A mother of two grown children and grandmother of one, Dennison has worked in a sardine factory, rope-making plant and as a bartender through the years. She has also taken numerous college courses in law enforcement and criminal justice.

Dennison started in law enforcement two decades ago as a corrections officer, later moving up to dispatcher and part-time patrol officer. She later became a full-time deputy, patrol sergeant, and for the last seven years has been a detective.

In her new post, Dennison plans to establish a drug task force that will have an educational component.

She and her partner, Steve Dennison, own a farm in St. George where they keep 10 horses and 40 beef cattle.

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Information from: Bangor Daily News, http://www.bangornews.com

AP-ES-11-09-06 1228EST