Grace Benny

Susan Grace Benny, née Anderson, (1872 – 5 November 1944) of Seacliff, South Australia, generally referred to as Grace Benny or S. Grace Benny, was the first woman elected to local government in Australia when she was elected to the Brighton Council in 1919.

Grace was born in the Crown Inn Hotel, Currie Street, Adelaide on 8 October 1872 to Peter Anderson and Agnes Ellen Anderson, née Harriot.

She grew up on the family's sheep station "Springfield", located near Stansbury, Yorke Peninsula. She married her cousin, solicitor Benjamin Benny (21 October 1869 – 10 February 1935), eldest son of the Reverend George Benny, on 16 July 1896 and moved to Adelaide where he worked. The couple moved to Seacliff in Adelaide's south and raised three daughters and two sons.

Grace was active in a range of community and political organisations and during the First World War was the Honorary Secretary of the Seacliff Cheer-up Society. She was also a member of the local progress association and spinning and croquet clubs.

Following World War I, Grace was a member of the Liberal Union Sturt District committee, president of the Brighton Women's Branch of the Liberal Union and was elected president of the Women's Branch of the South Australian Liberal Union in 1918. During this time she argued strongly for equality of divorce for women, which became law in South Australia in 1918.

Following the lead of her husband who was mayor of Brighton City Council 1903–1905, Grace became the first female member of a local government council in Australia. Believing that there was work to be done in the area that only a woman could do, she was elected to the newly created Seacliff ward on 22 December 1919. She held this seat through two elections and stood unsuccessfully for mayor in 1922, a defeat welcomed by at least one (Catholic) commentator.

As a council member Grace successfully argued for public access to the beach, the installation of electric lights and the allocation of reserves for a children's playground and public garden. She also actively supported the abolition of segregated sea-bathing so that families could swim together.

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