page_title: Anna Pennybacker
section_title: Activities
hierarchical_section_title: Anna Pennybacker / Activities
caption_attribution_description: English: Anna Pennybacker
context_page_description: Anna J. Hardwicke Pennybacker, known publicly after her marriage as Mrs. Percy V. Pennybacker, was the president of the American General Federation of Women's Clubs in the early 20th century, a Chautauqua speaker and a leader in the women's suffrage movement.
context_section_description: After quitting her paid work, Mrs. Pennybacker became active in the women's club movement; in 1901-1903 she was head of the Texas federation of clubs and in San Francisco in 1912 she was elected president of the General Federation of Women's Clubs for a two-year term.
  In 1888, she published A New History of Texas for Schools, which was adopted as the official text for public schools.
  In 1913, she told the fourth American Peace Conference that the then-current method of celebrating Independence Day in the United States was a "travesty." She suggested that
  children form floral processions at school buildings, march to some central point which would be made the scene of a general celebration, in which places of honor would be given to young men who have arrived at the age of 21 within the year. She further advocated that speeches should be made to these young men and that civic oaths containing peace clauses should be administered.
  The same year she urged that measures be taken to enforce the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act.
  In 1915, Mrs. Pennybacker became head of the National Women's Committee of Near East Relief, which had orphanages in Greece and in Palestine.
  A pacifist, she reluctantly supported American involvement in World War I.
  Afterwards, she set her goals on international peace and disarmament by working as a special correspondent to the League of Nations. She urged the United States to join the World Court and to sign the Kellogg-Briand Pact, renouncing war as an instrument of national policy.
  In a 1926 talk in Carnegie Hall, she told of her recent trip to Geneva and Greece. She was noted as "one of the most gifted speakers on the platform today."
  Active in the Chautauqua movement, Mrs. Pennybacker persuaded John D. Rockefeller Jr. to donate money that staved off bankruptcy. in 1935. She also influenced President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to speak at a fund-raising event.
caption: Pennybacker as sketched by Marguerite Martyn for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, February 1913[12]
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