Fernanda Nissen

Fernanda Thomesen was born in Sannidal, as the daughter of ship owner and consul Thomes Thomesen and Bertha Marthine Olea Debes. She was a niece of Ole Thomesen.[1]

She was married to newspaper editor and politician Lars Holst from 1882 to 1895, and to physician Oscar Egede Nissen from 1895 to 1911.[1] Through her sister Sophie, she was sister-in-law of painter and illustrator Erik Werenskiold, and an aunt of Werner and Dagfin Werenskiold.[2]

Nissen worked several years as a teacher, and later journalist. She was journalist for Dagbladet in the 1880s, and literary critic and theatre critic for the newspaper Social-Demokraten from 1892 to 1918. She was chairwoman for Fyrstikkarbeidernes fagforening from its establishment in 1889.[3] She edited the magazine Kvinden from 1909.[4] She was employed as a public film censor from 1913,[3] as one of the two first film censor in Norway.[1] She belonged to a network of female writers and critics, including Nini Roll Anker, Hulda Garborg and Sigrid Undset.[1] In the 1880s she was politically active for the Liberal Party. She represented the Labour Party in Kristiania city council from 1910.[4] As an Oslo politician she chaired the Park committee, and she worked for improving conditions for poor people, especially women and children.[3] She was also preoccupied with education, and the Oslo domestic school (Norwegian: Oslo kommunale husmorskole) was established on her initiative.[3]

She died in Barmen, Germany in 1920. A street in the borough Sagene in Oslo was named after her in 1923, and a memorial was put up in the Torshov Park in Oslo in 1931.[1]