Jessie Rooke

Jessie Spinks Rooke (10 September 1845 – 4 January 1906) was a suffragette and temperance reformer in Tasmania, Australia, and one of the first Tasmanian women to gain recognition outside Tasmania.

In 1896 Rooke toured Tasmania with suffrage superintendent Georgina Kermode. They arrange public meetings of women collecting campaign funds, distributing pamphlets and collecting signatures on a petition calling for the vote to be extended to women that was presented to the Tasmanian parliament at the end of 1896.

In 1898 she toured Tasmania again with South Australian Elizabeth Nicholls, they visited 30 towns collecting signatures on a petition. In 1898 she also became Tasmanian president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), becoming the groups Australiasian president in 1903. In 1903 Rooke and the WCTU organised women to vote in the federal election.

Rooke remained president of the WCTU until her death in 1906.

References

*Women of Tasmania. [http://www.women.tas.gov.au/significantwomen/search/jessierooke.html Jessie Spinks Rooke (1845-1906)]