- Born
- 22 September 1857Verden, Germany
- Died
- 20 December 1943Zurich, Switzerland · aged 86
Anita Augspurg
Germany’s first woman with a law doctorate fought for women’s suffrage, peace and resistance to the rising far right.
Anita Augspurg was born in Verden, Germany, in 1857. She trained as a teacher and worked as an actress before opening the Elvira photography studio in Munich with Sophia Goudstikker in the late 1880s. The studio became associated with the city’s artistic and women’s movement circles.
With German universities closed to women, Augspurg studied law in Zurich. In 1897 she became the first German woman to earn a doctorate in the subject. She used her legal knowledge to challenge laws that placed married women under their husbands’ authority.
With her partner Lida Gustava Heymann, she became a leading figure in the radical women’s movement. They helped establish a German women’s suffrage association in 1902 and took part in the international peace movement. During the First World War they supported the 1915 International Congress of Women in The Hague.
In 1923 Augspurg and Heymann called for Hitler’s expulsion from Bavaria. They were abroad when the Nazis came to power in 1933 and remained in exile. Both died in Zurich in 1943, having spent decades linking women’s political rights with opposition to militarism and authoritarian rule.