Augusta (Pakie) Macdougall

Augusta (Pakie) Macdougall (25 December 1875 – 8 May 1945) was a suffragette in England and a leading figure of the Australian theatre and the owner of a café that was home to the literati of Sydney.

Life Macdougall was born in the Sydney suburb of Waverley in 1875 on Christmas Day. She was the fifth child of Clara Ann (born Wonnocott) and Benjamin Quiddington Poole who worked in a quarry. After attending Leichhardt Superior Public School she trained as a nurse at Sydney's Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. Her interests were in feminism and politics in general. She had disobeyed an instruction by the police. She was caring for a suffragette who had been hurt by a mounted police officer's horse and she refused to leave her. She went to Holloway Prison for a fortnight. She was already pregnant as four months later their son was born - in the future Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald's house.

She and her husband separated in December 1928 and this did not help the Playbox theatre that they had tried to foster. It was based on the theatre group led by Eugene O'Neill. Her husband was a talented teacher and less gifted actor, while Augusta had been "the guiding spirit" of the theatre's productions and the company's secretary. The theatre moved twice and ended in 1931, meanwhile Augusta opened a cafe called "Pakie's" in 1929 at 219 Elizabeth Street. It was one of the 120 entries that year for the Archibald Prize.

Death and legacy Macdougall died in Sydney Hospital in 1945 as the result of being hit by a lorry the day before. Her cafe continued although maybe on a more commercial footing until 1966. The portrait of Pakie by Eric Saunders, which had been on the cafe's walls, was taken by her family. Her husband remarried. Dierdre O'Connell received a fellowship for her work on "Pakie’s Club: Mapping the Literary Salons of Augusta “Pakie” MacDougall 1875–1945" in 2023.