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Specially written for the National
League of Women Voters, for their
Honor Roll at Washington, D.C.

MATHILDE FRANISKA ANNEKE.
Poet, Journalist, Orator, Educator, Libertarian.

(by Hertha Anneke Sanne and Henriette M. Heinzen.)

The life of Mathilde Franziska Anneke, leader in the
movement for the advancement of women, belongs in the nine-
teenth century, but the influence of her ideas and inspiring
endeavors extends into the present time, in which many of her
radical and democratic ideals have been realized by means of
legislation.
According to an able student of the German element in the
United States, Dr. A. B. Faust of Cornell University, Mathilde
Franziska Anneke was undoubtedly the most heroic figure among
the many noble types of German women who have come to this
country. A talented poet and dramatist, a founder of radical
journals, a devoted wife and mother, she was above all others
the champion of human liberty, social political and intellec-
tual, and was surpassed by neither man nor woman of her gener-
ation in her ardent and fearless advocacy of freedom and
justice.
Mathilde Franziska Giesler was born on her grandfather's
estate, near Blankenstein, Westphalia, on April 3, 1817. Her
father was Karl Giesler, King's Counsellor, a godchild of the
great statesman, Baron von Stein. The beauty of her surround-
ings, both here and at the castle of Bankenstein where she
grew up, made an indelible impression on her sensitive imagin-
ation and helped to shape her poetic genius.
In her nineteenth year she married a Wesphalian nobleman,