Annie Nowlin Savery Des Moines Iowa Suffragette

Annie Nowlin Savery was all lace and lightning—smart, restless, and way too opinionated for a world that preferred its women quiet and breakable. She married James Savery, a businessman with money, charm, and no idea what kind of storm he’d invited to dinner. While he built hotels and railroads, Annie built a revolution.

She threw herself into every cause that promised to make the world a little less stupid—abolition, temperance, women’s rights. Her parlor became a war room for reformers. Picture velvet chairs, cigars, and Susan B. Anthony sitting by the fire planning how to blow up the patriarchy (politely, of course, with pamphlets). Annie wrote editorials so sharp they could slice wallpaper, and she never apologized for making men uncomfortable. “Mrs. Savery’s courage is not of the quiet kind,” one newspaper said.

When people told her that women shouldn’t talk politics, she invited them over and made them listen. When they said women couldn’t own property, she told them to read the law again because she was going to change it. Her energy was nuclear before anyone knew what that meant.

When the Panic of 1873 wiped out her husband’s fortune, Annie sold the silver, packed away the velvet, and kept on pushing for the vote. “A woman’s power,” she said, “is what she dares to claim.”

By the time she died in 1891, Des Moines had streetcars, gaslights, and a pulse that sounded a lot like Annie Savery’s heartbeat. She built the idea that women could build anything—and she did it in silk gloves with the patience of a saint and the bite of a buzz saw.