Anna Whitehead Bodeker

Anna Whitehead Bodeker (July 27, 1826 – October 26, 1904)[1][2] was an American suffragist who led the earliest attempt to organize for women's suffrage in the state of Virginia.

[5] Her husband worked as a clerk for a local druggist and would go on to open his own pharmaceutical business, A. Bodeker Apothecary, located on Richmond's Main Street, in 1864.

[2][5] At Bodeker's invitation, NWSA organizer Matilda Joslyn Gage addressed a small group of suffrage supporters at a public meeting at Bosher's Hall in Richmond on May 5, 1870.

[5][8][9] With the help of the NWSA, Bodeker and the VSWSA arranged for nationally known suffragists like Susan B. Anthony, Lillie Devereux Blake, Isabella Beecher Hooker, and Josephine Griffing to come to Richmond and speak about suffrage.

[6] In May 1871, Anthony appointed Bodeker to the National Woman Suffrage Educational Committee, a team of 34 women tasked with coordinating the association's future efforts.

[9] In 1872, with the help of delegate George Booker, Bodeker petitioned the General Assembly for legislation giving women the right to vote, again claiming the right of suffrage under the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments.

In her petition Bodeker asked legislators "to pass laws as may, in the wisdom of the general assembly, be deemed sufficient and necessary for enforcing the right of suffrage without regard to sex."

[2][6][12] Despite Bodeker's widely praised organizing skills, the women's suffrage movement failed to gain traction in Virginia immediately after the Civil War.

Meanwhile, the VSWSA was viewed publicly as being heavily associated with carpetbaggers and black Republicans, making it difficult to convince whites in Richmond to support its cause.