The Minnesota Woman Suffrage Memorial at the St. Paul State Capitol has Anna Dickie Olesen’s name on it. Courtesy of David Bly
first woman ever nominated by a major party for U.S. senator. Johnson wrote that Anna ran a “determined and hard-hitting” campaign as she “crisscrossed the state, speaking to as many as six audiences a day and repeatedly attacked her Republican opponent.” Anna’s brother Owen drove her around the state in a Ford sedan donated by her supporters. She kept expenses low by staying with friends along the way and accepting donations. In Washington, Sen. Kellogg was asked why he did not return to Minnesota to campaign. When he reportedly answered, “I’ve got some Swede woman running against me,” his questioner said, “That’s no Swede woman, that is a Welsh woman and the devil rides her tongue. You’d better go back to Minnesota.” Anna tallied 28,745 votes in the June 19 primary, winning handily over two male opponents. In her campaign speeches for the Senate, Anna said, “I ask no consideration because I am a woman. I also ask that no one close his mind against me because I am a woman.” But because she was a woman (with newly enfranchised female voters), her campaign drew
April 2015
Anna’s move to Northfield with husband Peter Olesen and daughter Mary in 1923 was front page news. The Aug. 24, 1923, Northfield News featured her designation by Who’s Who and the title given to her by Literary Digest as “One of the world’s fastest speakers.” Courtesy of the Northfield Historical Society and the Northfield News.
national attention. The New York Evening World said, “She has an excellent voice, personal magnetism and feminine charm backed by good sense and idealism.” A reporter from the Chicago Herald and Examiner followed her for a week as she visited six counties and marveled as “this wonder woman” turned skeptics into “ardent, shouting, cheering and sometimes happily tearful adherents” by the brilliance of her oratory. When Anna was nominated, she had promised to stand for the “common people, the true democracy of the land,” and when her campaign took her to Northfield, she brought along her friend from the Chautauqua circuit, William Jennings Bryan, nicknamed “The Great Commoner” for his belief in the wisdom of the common people. Bryan had been the Democratic candidate for president in 1896, 1900 and 1908 and was a renowned orator. The North-
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