Edith Searle Grossmann

Biographical information provided by Briar Barry for the He Tohu exhibition:

Edith Howitt Searle was born in 1863 in Australia but came to New Zealand with her parents in 1878. She was an exceptional student and went on to study at Canterbury College.

After graduating, Edith taught at Wellington Girls' High School until 1890. That same year she married Joseph Penfound Grossmann, a fellow student from Canterbury College, and they lived for a time in Christchurch where Joseph taught at Christchurch Boys' High School and their only child was born. In 1897 Edith spent 10 years apart from her husband in England and Europe. Joseph Grossmann was twice convicted of fraud in 1898 and was sentenced to two years in prison. He later became professor of history and economics at Auckland University College, until being dismissed from his professorship in 1932.

Edith published four novels between 1890 and 1910 which explored the struggle for the vote and for equal rights for women within marriage. She also wrote as a free-lance journalist for British and New Zealand newspapers and journals.

A biography of Edith Searle Grossman (1863 - 1931) appears in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography.