Long before Nikki Haley, Victoria Woodhull became the first woman to run for president

More than a century and a half before Nikki Haley’srun for the GOP presidential nomination, a fiery activist from Ohio became the first woman nominated for U.S. president.

Victoria Woodhull’s varied and colorful life makes her difficult to pigeonhole. The suffragist, medium, businesswoman, stockbroker and newspaper publisher was “Mrs. Satan” to some, a visionary champion of women’s and children’s rights to others. She rode motorcycles, preached “free love” and followed the guidance of an ancient Greek orator she believed had presented himself to her as a spirit guide.

The Equal Rights Party nominated Woodhull to face incumbent Republican Ulysses S. Grant in 1872 and Democrat Horace Greeley, nearly 50 years before women had the right to vote. At 34, she was a few months shy of the required age, but most historians still view her nomination and run as the first.

Woodhull lost, of course, but by how much is unclear. The number of votes she received in losing to Grant was never officially recorded, and historians surmise many were discarded. Nonetheless, interest in Woodhull’s life is renewed each time another woman makes a bid for the White House.

Woodhull was honored in and around her hometown in Homer, Ohio, with exhibits, lectures and prominent mention in the village’s bicentennial parade when Democrat Hillary Clinton became the first female nominee of a major party in 2016. Fans and history buffs visited the only U.S. memorial to Woodhull: a clock tower in nearby Granville where her wooden likeness emerges hourly to organ music.

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