Along with her siblings, she belonged to the fourth generation of a family of surgeons and pharmacists.
While continuing to run the pharmacy with her mother, Anna sent a request to the Provincial Commission on Medical Research to be registered as a pharmacist clerk, working in her late father's pharmacy, which would be run by an overseer.
After this law was amended in 1868, Tobbe applied again for admission to the examination and was accepted.
She received her diploma in The Hague on 10 July 1868, one week after Aaltje Visser from Lemmer, also the daughter of a pharmacist.
[3] The pharmacy continued to be run by a man, Lodewijk Wigersma, who had married Anna's sister Helena.