Elizabeth Anne Wells Cannon

Elizabeth Anne “Annie” Wells Cannon was a prominent Utah women’s suffragist, charter member of the Utah Red Cross, and president of the Daughters of Utah Pioneers. She served in the Utah House of Representatives from 1913 to 1915, and in 1921.

Annie, a daughter of Daniel H. Wells and Emmeline B. Wells, worked for fifteen years as a reporter and assistant editor for the Woman’s Exponent, the Utah Suffrage paper that her mother published and edited. In 1883 she wrote The History and Objectives of the Relief Society and co-authored the Relief Society Handbook.

She also wrote prose and verse that she had published in other magazines and newspapers. She was a member of several associations, including the Board of Directors of the American Relief Association, the National Woman’s Relief Society. U.S. president Herbert Hoover selected her to be Utah’s chairman for the European Relief Drive.

She was associate vice-president of the American Flag Association in 1918. She was national historian and twice state president of the Service Star Legion. She belonged to the American Woman’s Association, the Utah Woman’s Press Club, and the Order of Bookfellows.

Annie was born on December 7, 1859, in Salt Lake City. She married John Quayle Cannon and bore twelve children. She died of Hodgkin’s lymphoma in Salt Lake City on September 2, 1942.