Eleanor Smith (suffragist)


Eleanor Phoebe Smith was a New Zealand suffragist and magazine editor. She was considered one of the pioneers of the woman suffrage movement in New Zealand.

Biography

Smith was born in Bristol, England and married James Thomas Smith in 1849. The couple emigrated to New Zealand with their four children in 1860. The family settled in Christchurch and a further two children were born there.
Smith was a feminist who joined the New Zealand Women's Christian Temperance Union and the Canterbury Women's Institute. She was present at the first meeting of the National Council of Women in 1896 and was still a vice president of the Women's Institute at the time of her death. She was an active member of the St Albans Methodist Church and president of the church's Ladies' Guild.
In 1885, Smith became the editor of the magazine New Zealand Titbits. She wrote under the pen name "Vesta".
Smith died at her home in the Christchurch suburb of St Albans on 19 March 1913, and she was buried in Linwood Cemetery.