The WCTU began in Australia following visits from Jessie Ackerman  in 1889 and 1891; a number of other Christian Temperance and Abstinence Societies existed throughout Australia before that time. Jessie Ackermann acted as the round the world missionary for the American-based World's WCTU, and became the inaugural president of the federated Australasian WCTU, Australia's largest women's reform group. They were active in the struggle for the extension of the franchise to women through promoting suffrage societies, collecting signatures for petitions and lobbying members of parliament.