Anita Hoffman : Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Anita Hoffman

American activist, writer, and prankster

Anita Hoffman (née Kushner, March 16, 1942 – December 27, 1998) was an American Yippie activist, writer, prankster, and the wife of Abbie Hoffman.

Hoffman helped her husband plan some of the most memorable pranks of the Yippie movement. She supported Abbie Hoffman during his life underground while she raised their son, america (deliberately stylized with a lowercase a) Hoffman.

Hoffman edited a book published in 1976 of letters she and Abbie had written to each other from April 1974 through early March 1975 while Abbie was "underground" to avoid a prison sentence for allegedly selling cocaine, To America with Love: Letters From the Underground. She authored the novel Trashing, which she wrote under the pseudonym Ann Fettamen.^[1]

According to CNN, in "one of her most audacious moves, she went on a sort of diplomatic mission to Algeria to meet with Black Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver, and try to forge a coalition between the Panthers and the Yippies."

She died of breast cancer on December 27, 1998, aged 56.^[2]

Her life was dramatized in the 2000 film Steal This Movie, in which she was portrayed by Janeane Garofalo.^[3]

References

^ Raskin, Jonah (1998). For the Hell of It: The Life and Times of Abbie Hoffman. University of California Press p. 93. ISBN 978-0-5202-1379-1.
^ "Anita Hoffman, 56, who helped then-husband Abbie..." The Baltimore Sun. January 1, 1999. Retrieved October 29, 2020.
^ Hartl, John (August 13, 2000). "'Steal This Movie!': Film tells Abbie Hoffman story". The Seattle Times. Retrieved October 29, 2020.