A former Yukoner has taken over the top spot at the Saskatchewan RCMP.

Chief Supt. Brenda Butterworth-Carr was named the new commanding officer for Saskatchewan's "F” Division Wednesday.

She now becomes the first aboriginal woman to take the lead of an RCMP division.

Butterworth-Carr is originally from Dawson City. She joined the RCMP in 1987, first as a special constable in her hometown and later training in Saskatchewan.

After that instruction, she was assigned to general duty policing in the Yukon where she served in Whitehorse, Carmacks and Dawson City.

A member of the Tr'ondek Hwech'in First Nation, in 1999, she was promoted to be the Yukon's First Nations policing co-ordinator.

Butterworth-Carr continued climbing the ranks. In 2002, she was transferred to British Columbia to become district co-ordinator for aboriginal policing services.

In 2009, Butterworth-Carr took command of the Prince George, B.C. detachment, becoming the first woman and the first aboriginal person to hold the command post in northern B.C.

She was then promoted to chief superintendent, the fourth-highest rank in the RCMP hierarchy, becoming the Director General of National Aboriginal Policing and Crime Prevention Services at National Headquarters in Ottawa.

Again, Butterworth-Carr broke barriers with that role, becoming the first Canadian aboriginal woman ever to hold that rank.

When she last spoke to the Star in 2010, the then-44-year-old mother of three said the move to Ottawa would be a change, but something she was looking forward to.

"It's not unusual for me to go out and work on the ground with my officers,” she said of life at the Prince George detachment at the time.

"So moving from an operational to an administrative level will be an adjustment.

"But my expectation is to go and look at what has already been established and bring that experience of being at an operational level and being on the ground to my new job. I think that will be a real strength.”

Butterworth-Carr is replacing current Saskatchewan RCMP commanding officer, assistant commissioner Russ Mirasty. 

Mirasty was the first First Nations person to command an RCMP division when he started the job in Saskatchewan in December 2010.

He is retiring after 36 years with the RCMP.

– With a file from The Canadian Press.