[en] In an experiment carried out at the Brookhaven National Laboratory Alternating Gradient Synchrotron, eight candidates for the reaction ν/sub μ/ + N → μ + e + anything were observed with a total background of 1.5 +- 0.6 events. The detector consisted of twenty-eight optical spark chambers interspersed with liquid and plastic scintillation counters. Events classified as muon--electron final states are required to have a long noninteracting straight track in conjunction with an electromagnetic shower characteristic of that produced by an electron. Background processes are discussed and the total muon--electron background calculated. The ratio of the number of muon--electron candidates to all charged current events, corrected for the percentage of the neutrino beam above threshold is R' = [sigma(ν/sub μ/ + N → μ + e + anything)]/[sigma(ν/sub μ/ + N → μ + anything)] greater than or approximately 10^-2. 47 references